An account of the incredible retreat of the Italian intellectual: his heyday and his decline.
A cultural and alternative guide to Italy’s Cinque Terre.
An expanse of open and diffuse light, a mild breeze, my gaze is drawn to the languorous curve of the Tyrrhenian sea. There were many there, perhaps by chance, perhaps occasional guests that intended to stay for a night but instead lingered on for the whole summer. Ever since artists realized that in order to be beautiful a landscape must also have a soul, painters, writers and travellers have come to the Cinque Terre and Bocca di Magra in their hundreds.    
“Lower your eyes, Jack: we’ll walk down the path, between the dahlias and hydrangeas. Now we are on the avenue lined with Japanese mock-orange shrubs, now the pebble-dashed path leading to the sea and the white strand.”