LIFE & PEOPLE

For a little town just off the A16 autostrada, east of Naples, Nola has some big claims to fame. Spartacus once conquered it, Hadrian tried and the first Roman Emperor Caesar Augustus died here. Nola also famously introduced bells to …

The legacy between Genoa and San Francisco is now stronger than ever. Two years after the visits of some other Genovese representatives, Italian Americans in the bay welcomed Marco Bucci, currently serving as Genoa Mayor since his election in June …

Maria Lucia Luongo is a woman who takes joy in the simple pleasures of life: cooking, fashion, yoga, friendships. For the past 70 years, life’s twists and turns have taken her from her roots in Naples to the city of …

Even though present-day hospitals all around the world are basically centers providing medical assistance and rehabilitation of the sick, the forerunners to these institutions were originally conceived in a broader sense as “places of hospitality:” hence the similarity between the …

Usually, in Italy, you’d sense electricity in the air before the soccer World Cup begins: the country’s passion for calcio is well known, and when it comes to the national team, you can bet even the least likely among us …

Sturdy yet light, with its typical red color it made the cupola of Firenze’s duomo unique in the world: this is the terracotta dell’Impruneta, a small village only a stone throw away from Tuscany’s capital. Jars, vases, tiles, shingles, all …

Summer is on its way, or so we all hope here in Italy. The weather remains unstable, albeit temperatures are pleasant and I happily enjoyed my first seasonal swim in the sea over a week ago. In any case, with …

Born Joanne Stefani Germanotta, Lady Gaga was raised in Manhattan, but her melodramatic excess and sense of the theatrical baroque might spring from her Sicilian cultural matrix. Her grandfather came from Naso, a small, isolated, aristocratic town with 4,000 residents …

“I have conducted regularly in Italy for over thirty years, and love the country for its beauty, its culture and its language.” James Conlon, director of the LA Opera, cannot hide his love for Italy while commenting his recent nomination …

Around the first half of the 19th century, during the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies, Lent days were called giorni di scammaro and people had to eat quite frugally, avoiding meat and rich foods. It is in this period that …