Indeed, Norwich finds this home of Mount Etna and the Mafia to be one of the saddest places in Europe, despite its gorgeous natural beauty and climate. Sicily is an enigmatic place, situated in the Mediterranean exactly between West and East, Africa and Europe, the Greek and Latin worlds, constantly overrun by competing interests much resented by its largely agrarian population. Norwich gives special attention to the “golden age” of the 11th and 12th centuries under the Normans. In this charming, elegiac volume, the author, now in his mid-80s, lays out the broad swath of conquest in Sicily, from the ancient Greeks to the American invasion as part of Operation Husky in World War II. The Normans in the South (1967) encapsulated Norwich’s ( A History of England in 100 Places, 2011, etc.) fascination with the brief but strenuous Norman influence in Sicily (especially the architecture) and his astonishment at how little his readers knew about it. The eminent British historian returns to a subject and place that inspired his first book 50 years ago.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |