Italy

The lure of St James’s

14 June 2025 9:00 am

Procrastination may be the thief of time, but in the right circumstances, it can be fun. The other day, I…

The past is another country: Ripeness, by Sarah Moss, reviewed

14 June 2025 9:00 am

The voice of teenage Edith caring for her pregnant sister in Italy alternates with that of her elderly self in contemporary Ireland in a story of identity, belonging and consent

No, I’m not a British spy

7 June 2025 9:00 am

Dante’s Beach, Ravenna The youngest of our six children, Giuseppe, nine, received the Eucharist for the first time on Sunday.…

The loveliness of Ligurian wine

31 May 2025 9:00 am

We were talking about Italy: where and when to sojourn. I confessed to so many gaps. It is years since…

‘I secreted a venom which spurted out indiscriminately’ – Muriel Spark

31 May 2025 9:00 am

Frances Wilson’s mesmerising biography of one of the past century’s most singular writers is especially enlightening on the ‘domestic savagery’ often required of a great artist

The world reveres British music

19 April 2025 9:00 am

I have just returned from the lovely Italian city of Rimini, where 300 local singers had gathered for a weekend…

Vindictive to the last: a Nazi atrocity in Tuscany

12 April 2025 9:00 am

Even in retreat in August 1944, a German posse carried out a particularly brutal triple murder at a hillside farm outside Florence in a vendetta against the Einstein family

In search of Pico della Mirandola, the quintessential Renaissance Man

15 February 2025 9:00 am

Though the scholar himself remains an enigma, his theories about language as a portal to the divine are explored in depth by Edward Wilson-Lee

If Meloni is ‘far right’, why are neo-Nazis trying to kill her?

9 December 2024 11:24 pm

Dante’s Beach, Ravenna Italian police have arrested 12 alleged terrorists who are accused of plotting a Day of the Jackal…

The medicinal powers of a good book

26 October 2024 9:00 am

‘And they lived happily ever after. The end.’ ‘Again.’ My poor father, bidden to read the story of the moment…

Meloni’s migration strategy is working – and the rest of Europe is watching

19 October 2024 9:00 am

Giorgia Meloni, Italy’s first female Prime Minister, has this week achieved what the Tories failed so fatally to do with…

Should I grow old gracefully – or disgracefully?

28 September 2024 9:00 am

Now that I’m about to turn 70, I’m wondering: shall I grow old gracefully, or disgracefully? Everyone I know, young…

A visit to the world’s worst capital city

27 July 2024 9:00 am

Nouakchott in Mauritania is often referred to as the ‘worst capital city in the world’. That may be a little…

Italians are beautiful – but not on this beach

29 June 2024 9:00 am

When Pope Francis complained recently about too much frociaggine (faggotry) in the Catholic Church, he certainly struck a chord in…

Pure Puccini: an opera lover’s melodramatic family history

29 June 2024 9:00 am

Flamboyant theatrics were part of Michael Volpe’s life as CEO of Opera Holland Park. But those of his feuding Italian relatives rival anything seen on stage

Admit it – Italian food is rubbish

25 May 2024 9:00 am

Every year I’m summoned to a gathering which I strive to avoid. My first cousin, who loves a boozy party,…

Giorgia Meloni’s opponents are becoming hysterical

4 May 2024 4:00 pm

Like drowning men clutching at straws, Giorgia Meloni’s opponents are trying ever more hopelessly to justify their claim that she is a…

My life of genteel poverty

13 April 2024 9:00 am

Every year at the beginning of April, I tell myself I must top up my Isa before the 5 April…

Under the Italian sun, the insects are stirring

6 April 2024 9:00 am

The sun was setting on the first day of spring and I felt unusually happy as I fed the donkey.…

Dangerous secrets: Verdigris, by Michele Mari, reviewed

20 January 2024 9:00 am

A lonely teenager on holiday in Italy befriends his grandparents’ elderly gardener and slowly coaxes out his painful memories of betrayals and reprisals during the war