When I chose the book, La Bella Lingua; My love affair with Italian, the world's most enchanting language, I didn't know I would come away learning so much. I never knew the depth and history behind the Italian language until I turned the pages of this book. The first thing that struck me was on the very first page of the Introduction. '"Learning a new language is like growing a new head', a European friend told me long ago. "You see with new eyes, hear with new ears, and speak with a new tongue.'" This was a revelation to me. Maybe that is why I was never successful at my French or Spanish classes. The first chapter taught me that inorder to learn Italian, I have to disregard what I know about my own language and learn Italian as if I'm learning a language for the first time. This book taught me that Italian differs depending on the region or town you're from. Long, long ago people in Italy couldn't understand people who spoke different dialects because the words were so different. The book talked about the move from using Latin to using Italian. After hundreds and hundreds of years of using Latin, Italian words found their way in more than just everyday language. Writers, playwrights, and poets began using their dialect in their works. Some even wrote them in multiple Italian dialects. Plays, and eventually Operas and movies, were written in certain dialects so that everyone could understand it. There was a time when most of Italy was illiterate and it was much easier for them to learn to read and write in their own dialect. It wasn’t until the last century that the Italian language became more unified.
Through the author of this book, I learned the importance of Italian art and writing. She frequented art museums and libraries, opera houses and theaters in order to gain a sense of who Italians were and what shaped their way of life and language today. She talked about love and lust and how they shaped the lives of people hundreds of years ago. This, in turn, shaped popular literature and inspired many phrases in Italian. She even dedicated an entire chapter to Dante and his immense impact on Italian literature. His impact was so great that people today still use phrases and words that refer to one of Dante’s works.
Then the author talks about the importance of food in Italian culture. She talks about a woman she knew that spoke no English when she spoke very little Italian. They became friends through food. The woman would cook her spectacular meals originating from different parts of the country and she would truly taste the food. She used all of her senses; she would smell, taste, and see the food in front of her and allow herself to be consumed by the meal. She would learn about the history of the food or the area it came from and that is how she truly came to know Italian. This author immersed herself in the culture as well as the history in order to fully understand and become one with Italy.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It contained so much history behind Italy and its words and language. But it didn’t do so in a dry, textbook way. It was exciting to read and discover the past and present of Italy and the language.
