ON PERSEPHONE’S ISLAND: A Sicilian Journal ...
ON PERSEPHONE’S ISLAND: A Sicilian Journal by Mary Taylor Simeti, illustrated by Maria Vica Costarelli (Vintage: $13; 330 pp.). Simeti’s one-year stay on Sicily stretched into a 20-year love affair with the island and its people. In her account of a single year, she contrasts the peace of the countryside with the noisy chaos of the crime-ridden cities. Visits to famous ruins allow her to reflect on the Greek, Roman, Arabic, Norman and Spanish eras of Sicilian history. Married to the son of an aristocratic family, Simeti writes from the double vantage point of a member of society and an outsider.
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