The Dark Heart of Italy

Tobias Jones' remarkable book essential reading for Italy enthusiasts: The Dark Heart of Italy (subtitled Travels Through Time and Space across Italy) is unlike any book on the country you may have read before. It is not a guide to Italy's art, or her geographical splendours. Nor is it a guide to her amazing cuisine. And it is not an examination of the Italian character. It does, however, contain elements of all of these and much more. When the author emigrated to Italy in 1999, he expected the customary ravishing of the senses that Italy usually provides. But, looking beneath the surface, Jones was astonished to encounter surprising undercurrents, among them national paranoia and the crippling fear inspired by terrorists (the Italian parliament, it seems, has a 'Slaughter Commission').

This is, of course, the country of Silvio Berlusconi, the tycoon whose controversial election via his stranglehold on the media was (to British eyes at least) something that should not be countenanced in a non-totalitarian country. While always taking on board the glories of Italy, Jones' picture of the country is both fascinating and disturbing: this is a land torn apart by civil wars and endemic corruption, the still influential Cosa Nostra and unbending Catholicism exert considerable sway.

Italy remains utterly unlike any of its European neighbours. Jones sees links between the powerful creativity of the Italian soul and the 'dark heart' that he refers to in his title. What is most remarkable about the book is the fact that no one who loves Italy will be at all disenchanted to encounter the truths that Jones presents to us. If anything, the complex and contradictory nation that emerges will hold an even greater fascination for both the serious student and the casual visitor. --Barry Forshaw

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far from reality - Rated
The author does't know what he is talking about. His vision of Italy, its politics and Italians is naive. It is never a good idea to generalize about a country and its citizens, especially if someone is not an anthropologist and especially if the description carries a judgement in itself. And if you are not a glottologist it is not wise to interpret the language according to the ethimology of the words without placing the latters in their contemporary context and use. In fact it is the use that makes the language, regardless its origin, especially if we are talking about familiar expressions. The author's vision of Italy and Italians is superficial, and I am only talking about the first chapter. The title of the book presents the book itself as a reference book for anyone travelling to the Country. In fact it is only a very restricted view of an ordinary foreigner who doesn't know much about the culture and uses of the country he is visiting. I would suggest the author to read "Watching the English" by Kate Fox as example of honest writing. In fact, Kate Fox is an anthropologist and also she does not judge the social phenomena she describes. Viola Petrella

Thanks Brits! - Rated
In Italy this book caused a small wave of anglophobia.
However, we italians must thank you brits because of your great jouranlists, Tobias Jones and David Lane. They are the voice of 50% of Italians who hate Berlusconi.
Read their books and you'll know who we Italians are.

The emotions of a newcomer bring back the memories... - Rated
This is a great to book to read for those resident in Italy over the last thirty years - I relived it all. The bomb in Piazza Fontana when I could hear the roar of the sirens from my office, the young recruits with their rifles outside the Leonardo De Vinci Lyceum, Corso XXII Marzo where Zibecchi was crushed to death by an armoured police van etc., etc., events which happened close to my home. All the bewilderment of the new arrival at the Italian way of doing things, of their art to "arrangiarsi", the scandalous verdicts, the never ending trials and the hopes that some day things will change and now the Berlusconi catastrophe are sensations which Jones experienced 30 years on...Nothing has changed and his conclusion is identical. The last chapter moved me to tears because despite everything I couldn't choose a better place to live in: Italy and the Italians have cast their spell...

An amusing book, but quite superficial. - Rated
As an Italian living in the north of Italy I don't understand why Mr. Jones fights so angrily against italian banks, postal offices and police offices for foreigners. In forty years living here I never experienced problems with banks or postal offices. Maybe I can meet the same problems if I will go in England. I enjoyed the humorous writing of Mr. Jones and I laughed for his description of the Italian bureaucracy. Much of what he says about dishonesty and corruption it's absolutely true, but I think he himself is really distant from italian meanings, and always patronizing. He doesn't understand that Italians work much harder than most people believe. It doesn't exactly fit with the carefree image wich the British is happy to accept as the truth. It's absolutely true that in many italian televisions you can see a lot of trash, but I can see a lot of stupid programs also in the BBC ! And, most of all, I agreed with the first reader that the role of Catholic Church (even if I'm not a believer) in Italy is not well investigated by Mr. Jones, who often demands to people: why are you catholics ? A nonsense question for an italian. I want to underline that there is ignorance of other religions, but not intolerance outside the Catholic Church, as Mr. Jones wrote, because there are not protestants in Italy, so the people simply don't know them. At last, I think Mr. Jones is a good journalist, but he hasn't a really profound knowledge of Italy.

A well padded out vacation book - Rated
I was given this book by a colleague after spending a week in Italy with him on business so that I could better understand a lot of what I had failed to understand over that week!

That Tobias Jones is an amusing and entertaining writer is clear as one works through the chapters and this is in part due to many chapters being originally magazine articles and so have a self contained conciseness. The book is thus a great "toe dipper" in that one can read each chapter alone and overall get a good feel for modern Italy across a great variety of topics including Italian language, the Catholic Church, Football, the schism between Left and Right and the experience of Berloscuni's second rise to power and the subsequent "benevolent dictatorship" model that ensued. As a future or recent visitor to Italy this all makes for great background reading.

However, this is not a great book in being insightful or incisive as to why Italy is as it is, especially today under Berloscuni and so soon after the "Clean Hands" uprising that led to the quick and unforeseen collapse of the Second Republic. Many chapters are padded out with a synopsis type history of Italy that in a magazine article may work but in chapter after chapter in a book do not. The most extreme example is the chapter on the Sofri case which at 23 pages has only just over three pages on actually meeting with Sofri in prison which is the reason for the story.

Also one supects that Jones as one clearly in love with Italy may be too close and so lose some objectivity, as evidenced in his closing chapter on the Italian fascination with Death where the role of the Catholic Church in perpetuating (Jackie Kennedy's famous quote that the one thing the Catholic Church really understood was how to use death)is never mentioned.