The other day, after speaking at a conference and going out for dinner, I happened to pass a noisy and friendly family in the lobby of my hotel. They had…
Read more →
Articoli
Everyone knows that learning a foreign language exposes you to another culture. New words open doors to new ideas and things.
But sometimes, it works the other way around. New…
It’s commencement speech season. I have never been under the illusion that any educational institution would ever ask me to give America’s answer to the papal benediction. Yet over the…
Read more →Though I returned to the United States last summer after 30 years of living in Italy, daily events still have me comparing the two countries. You would think that three…
Read more →Irecently saw “The Opera House,” a delightful documentary by Susan Froemke about the Metropolitan Opera’s 1966 move from its beloved and ramshackle home in New York’s theater district to its…
Read more →
While watching the Winter Olympics when I should have been writing, I heard the same cliché over and over. Whether it was advertisers hawking cars or commentators telling competitors’…
When I first moved to Italy 30 years ago, its politics bewildered me. I couldn’t keep the innumerable parties and factions straight. News reports hindered more than they helped. Coverage…
Read more →In the United States, the winter and Christmas seasons officially begin the day after Thanksgiving, about a week earlier than I’d been used to when I lived in Milan. There,…
Read more →When I first moved to Rome in 1988, politician Giovanni De Michelis was among the most powerful men in Italy. He was Socialist Prime Minister Bettino Craxi’s right hand man.…
Read more →One of the various byproducts of the 2016 presidential campaign is a kind of news report that follows this pattern:
A member of the coastal media elite or a personality…