The Dark Heart of Italy

by TobiasJones (Author)

• New

  Paperback
  2005

  $21.26

• Used

  Paperback
  2007

  $3.29

  In 1999 Tobias Jones emigrated to Italy, expecting to discover the pastoral bliss described by centuries of foreign visitors. Instead, he discovered a very different country, besieged by unfathomable terrorism and deep-seated paranoia, where crime is scarcely ever met with punishment. The Dark Heart of Italy is Jones' account of his three-years voyage across the Italian peninsula. Jones is preoccupied not by Italy's art, climate, or cuisine, but by the livelier and stranger sides of the Bel Paese: language, football, Catholicism, cinema, television and terrorism. Why, he wonders, is there a parliamentary commission investigating Italy's terrorist 'slaughters', and why do bombs still explode every time politics start getting serious? Why does everyone urge him to go home as soon as possible, saying that Italy is a 'brothel'? And, why do people warn him that 'Clean Hands' only disguise 'Dirty Feet'? Slowly, though, one clear truth emerges: the entire country is in the hands of one man. He owns banks, estate agencies, mobile phone companies - not to mention half the television channels, one of the best football teams, and great swathes of Milan. His personal wealth is estimated at $14 billion. And now, thanks to his coalition with 'Post-Fascists', he - Silvio Berlusconi - has become President of the Ministerial Council. Could this be why everyone in Italy is so paranoid?

• Used

  Hardcover
  2003

  $3.29

  Why is Italy still riven with internal conflict? Why does one man - Silvio Berlusconi - appear to own everything from Padre Nostro to Cosa Nostra? Tobias Jones sets out to answer these and many other questions during his three-year voyage across the Italian peninsula. What emerges is not a book about the tourist concerns of climate, cuisine and art, but one about the much livelier and stranger side of the Bel Paese : the language, football, Catholicism, cinema, television and terrorism - and the grip exercised by Berlusconi through his vast media empire and Presidency of the Ministerial Council. The Italy Tobias Jones discovers is a country which is proudly visual rather than verbal , and where crime is hardly ever followed by punishment. It is a place of incredible illusionism, where it is impossible to distinguish fantasy from reality, fact from fiction.