THE DARK HEART OF ITALY: An Incisive Portrait of Europe's Most Beautiful, Most Disconcerting Country
Tobias Jones, . . FSG/North Point, $24 (336pp) ISBN 978-0-86547-700-1
With his first book, Jones must now be admitted to the company of writers such as Alexander Stille and Tim Parks who seem to understand Italy and the Italians better than the natives do themselves. Jones excels at writing about the passions aroused on the soccer field and the dirty machinations in the club offices in an entertaining chapter entitled "Penalties and Impunity." He realizes, though, that soccer is just a manifestation of a deeper, lurking cancer: Italy's dismal mediacracy. It all began in the wake of "Tangentopoli," the massive corruption scandal in the early 1990s that brought down a regime that included the eternally powerful Christian Democrats and their partners in a Faustian pact, the Socialists. Into this political vacuum stepped the irrepressible owner of the country's most successful soccer club, A.C. Milan, Silvio Berlusconi. He built a media empire that now touches every aspect of daily life in Italy; his presence hovers over Italians much as Big Brother hovers over
Reviewed on: 04/19/2004
Genre: Nonfiction
Hardcover - 266 pages - 978-0-571-20582-0
Open Ebook - 352 pages - 978-0-571-24605-2
Other - 336 pages - 978-1-4668-0451-7
Paperback - 336 pages - 978-0-86547-724-7
Paperback - 306 pages - 978-0-571-23593-3