Barrie Kerper - Tuscany and Umbria: The Collected Traveler

A VINTAGE DEPARTURES ORIGINAL, JULY 2010

Copyright 2000, 2010 by Barrie Kerper

All rights reserved. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto.

Vintage is a registered trademark and Vintage Departures and colophon are trademarks of Random House, Inc.

Some of the material originally published in the United States as part of Central Italy by Three Rivers Press, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, in 2000.

Owing to limitations of space, all acknowledgments to reprint previously published material can be found .

Grateful acknowledgment is made to the publisher for permission to reprint the following recipes: La Panzanese Grilled Steak contributed by Dario Cecchini, Chickpea Pure with Shrimp contributed by Fulvio and Emanuela Pierangelini, and Broccoli and Cauliflower Sformatino contributed by Benedetta Vitali, from Adventures of an Italian Food Lover: With Recipes from 254 of My Very Best Friends by Faith Heller Willinger. Copyright 2007 by Faith Willinger. Reprinted by permission of Clarkson Potter/Publishers, an imprint of the Crown Publishing Group, a division of Random House, Inc.

All photographs by Peggy Harrison ( (courtesy of the Italian Government Tourist Board North America, Fototeca ENIT, photo by: Vito Arcomano). The photos of Laurie Albanese, Charles Darwall, Dianne Hales, Lisa McGarry, and Laura Morowitz are reproduced courtesy of their subjects.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Tuscany and Umbria : the collected traveler / edited by Barrie Kerper.
p. cm.(The collected traveler) (Vintage departures)
An inspired companion guide.
A Vintage departures originalT.p. verso.
Previous ed.: New York : Three Rivers Press, 2000,
with title Central Italy, Tuscany & Umbria.
Includes bibliographical references.
eISBN: 978-0-307-47673-9
1. Tuscany (Italy)Description and travelSources. 2. Umbria (Italy)Description
and travelSources. 3. Travelers writings. 4. Tuscany (Italy)Biography.
5. Umbria (Italy)Biography. 6. InterviewsItalyTuscany. 7. Interviews
ItalyUmbria. 8. Tuscany (Italy)Social life and customsSources. 9. Umbria
(Italy)Social life and customsSources. 10. Cookery, Italian. I. Kerper, Barrie.
II. Central Italy, Tuscany & Umbria.
DG734.23.T87 2010
914.5504dc22
2010010183

Book design by Jo Anne Metsch

www.vintagebooks.com

v3.1

Once again, to my mother, Phyllis,

who always believed my boxes of files

held something of value,

and to my father, Peter,

the most inspiring person in my life

I taly is both [wonderful and awful] because it is a real country,
and not fairyland (even though, now and again, it is just
possible to believe that it might be fairyland).

D AVID L EAVITT AND M ARK M ITCHELL ,
Italian Pleasures

For most of us, Tuscany is the quintessence of Italy, the distillation of all those elements of the country that we think of as being most specifically Italian.

John Julius Norwich, from the foreward to
Tuscany: An Anthology, by Laura Raison

The more leisurely visitor, especially if he has a motorcar to putter about in, soon learns how much his hurried compatriot has missed. He finds that a wealth of hill towns beckon him closer. By the time he has seen such miniature Carcasonnes as Spello, Spoleto, Cascia, and Gubbio, he realizes that this Umbrian region is one of the neglected treasures of Italy. Though he may have found a dearth of fashionable spots for the skier, the casino hound, and the sun worshiper, he has encountered good food and wine, and comfortable places to stop overnightalmost everything, in fact, except his fellow tourist.

Samuel Chamberlain,
Italian Bouquet: An Epicurean Tour of Italy (1958)

T USCANY IS WITHOUT doubt one of the most visited regions of Italy and is the region many people think of first when they think of Italy. And with good reason: the treasures and pleasures of Florence alone could easily hold ones attention for years. Umbria, often known as the green heart of Italy, exists somewhat in Tuscanys shadow, but happily within the last dozen or so years many visitors have discovered that it, too, offers world-class gems of art and architecture, and its cuisine and landscapes are the equal of its neighbors.

Some people feel that Tuscany, Florence especially, is too clichd and too popular for its own good, and too much like anywhere else. (Often visitors complain excessively about the problems tourism creates, about Italian corruption and bureaucracy; but I like to remind them of a remark made many, many years ago by Lord Byron: There is, in fact, no law or government at all [in Italy]; and it is wonderful how well things go on without them. But those who think Italy isnt exotic enough to be travelworthy are simply mistaken: things are different in Tuscany and Umbria. Such everyday scenes as a young woman crossing a cobblestone street in stiletto heels balancing two cups of espresso, men conversing animatedly using so many unfamiliar hand gestures and facial expressions youd think you had landed on Mars, widowed women dressed head to toe in black, or merchants closing up shop simultaneously for la pausa (the lunchtime siesta) on a hot summer afternoon are just as foreign to a North American as what you might experience in Asia or Africa.

Florence, like other cities throughout Tuscany and Umbria, is filled with much that is old but also plenty that is new. Unfortunately, some American fast-food chains have found a foothold here and many international stores are the very same ones we find in North America; still, it is mostly the older sites we come to see. I for one will never forget the day I first saw Santa Maria del Fiore, Florences Duomo: as I walked down a narrow street, the name of which I no longer remember, I saw a sliver of it suddenly; as I approached it and discerned the different colors and patterns of marble, I was filled with a warmth and a happiness to be alive Ive rarely felt again. Over the years, no matter how crowded Florence becomes, the Duomo will never fail to impress.