Italian Education [Paperback]

Tim Parks (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 1996

Tim Parks' first bestseller, Italian Neighbors, chronicled his initiation into Italian society and cultural life. Reviewers everywhere hailed it as a bravissimo performance. Now he turns to his children -- born and bred in Italy -- and their milieu in a small village near Verona.

With the splendid eye for detail, character, and intrigue that has brought him acclaim as a novelist, he creates a fascinating portrait of Italian family life, at school, at home, in church, and in the countryside. This panoramic journey winds up with a deliciously seductive evocation of an Italian beach holiday that epitomizes everything that is quintessentially Italian. Here is an insider's Italy, re-created by "one of the most gifted writers of his generation" (Jonathan Yardley, The Washington Post)

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

In Italian Neighbors, British-born Parks gave a wry portrait of his adopted Italy, where he lives with his native-born wife Rita in a village outside Verona. This engaging sequel is an affectionate family album focusing on the experience of raising their son, Michele, and daughter, Stefania, combined with general observations on childrearing practices in Italy. Parks believes the typical Italian child is born into a tight social matrix of caution, inhibition and a suffocating awareness of everything that can go wrong. For Italians, "pregnancy is, inescapably, a pathology," and the intense mother-child relationship, suffused with eroticism, often produces young men with "an extraordinarily inflated, mother-fed opinion of themselves." Beyond parenting, Parks serves up pungent cultural commentary. His Italy is a paradox, where an ancient mentality steeped in peasant Catholic traditions coexists with a hedonistic society that eagerly embraces all things modern. Parks's wit, eye for telling incident and sensuous prose make this a captivating family portrait.
Copyright 1995 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

When expatriate novelist Parks wrote about living in Italy in Italian Neighbors (1992), he focused on the process of acclimation and his often tricky relationships with adults. Now, in another charming and fluidly composed volume of keen observations, amusing anecdotes, and creative musings, he considers the "world of children," especially of his own inventively bilingual son and daughter, who, Parks must concede, will grow up thoroughly Italian in spite of being half English. Childhood in Italy is a fecund topic for Parks, a perfect conduit for analyzing all the quirks of Italian society. As Parks attempts to define what exactly makes Italians Italian, he discusses everything from bureaucracy to lullabies, attitudes toward pregnancy and large families, food preferences, the worship of conformity, the "mama mystique," typical vacations, adultery, school events, and textbooks. Thus the concept of "Italian education" works on two levels. While Parks is describing how Italians teach each other to be Italian, he's also teaching us outsiders all about their richly textured culture. This is an intelligent and sunny book, glimmering with all the contradictions and joys of daily life. Donna Seaman --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Paperback: 352 pages
• Publisher: Harper Perennial (September 1, 1996)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0380727609
• ISBN-13: 978-0380727605
• Product Dimensions: 8 x 5.2 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.8 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (26 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,236,780 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Edgier Sequel to Italian Neighbors, October 5, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: Italian Education (Paperback)

This is a difficult review for me to write since my problems with Tim Parks's book have a can't-quite-put-my-finger-on-it-quality. There's much to enjoy about the book, of course--the descriptions of the beach culture in Italy are particularly wonderful. As an American who's lived in both Italy and England I really enjoyed the comparisons with child rearing, particularly the Italian obsessive floor moping culture with the English slightly more casual approach. I was glad, too, that Parks was open about his wife's Italian identity-- his coyness about her "nonforeignness" was irritating in "Italian Neighbors". Something, however, was lacking in this book for me. I missed the group of neighbors that he described with such detail--I missed their dramas, and their life stories. Mr. Parks seemed to exist in a vacuum with his family. (Now it could be that Mr. Parks ran into some trouble with being so free with other people's lives and decided to be more discreet; I don't know.) I do feel that this book was more disjointed and could have been compressed into a span of a year, or at least put into a more coherent framework, as he did with "Italian Neighbors". These aren't my main problems with the book. There is a bit of a sourness in the tone; it is as if Parks has made his Italian bed and must lie in it. He must also raise his children as Italian, for good or bad, and it is this dominant theme that he wrestles with throughout the book. Without a doubt this in an expatriot's main dilemma--to raise your children successfully in a different culture, you must raise them as foreign to yourself. I'm not sure, deep down, the Mr. Parks is entirely happy with this realization, and a bit of his disillusionment leaks out into the book. Gone is his tone of ironic detachment, and yes, there is often more warmth and feeling, but at what price? (I will mention, though, that the scene when he explodes near the German border after dealing with his beyond-colicky daughter was priceless and the best scene of either book for me) I guess what I'm trying to say is that I often pick up "Italian Neighbors" to reread bits of it, and I don't do that with this book. And that, ultimately, is the final review of all.

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing, July 16, 2001

By 

Vince Cabrera (Wellington, NZ) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Italian Education (Paperback)

I read "Italian Neighbours" in less than a weekend and couldn't wait for this book to arrive. Unfortunately, I found it a bit disappointing.

Like another reviewer, I can't quite put my finger on what it is that I don't like. Maybe TP sounds a little bitter and less ready to concede that there may be advantages to the Italian mindset. He seems to do nothing but whinge about Italy which started to wear on me a bit. Again, like the other reviewer, I also miss his previous neighbours. They were much better observed and more detailed than the current batch.

Furthermore, Park's observations about Italy in general are not as accurate as they were in "Italian Neighbours". He seems to have extrapolated life in Montecchio, a small place in the Veronese to the rest of Italy and sometimes this just doesn't hold water. A small example: contrary to Tim Park's writing, Italian shools DO offer extracurricular activities and they DO offer school sports. Well, at least in Lombardy they do.

As I said, I finished "Italian Neighbours" in under a weekend. I thought the book was so good that I really wanted to MEET Tim Parks. This second book took me over two weeks, and even that was real hard going what with Tim Park's constant whingeing and all. That just about says it all for me.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Entertaining, with a warm and perceptive view of Italy, October 22, 1997

By A Customer

This review is from: Italian Education (Paperback)

This wonderful book is a moving and informative account of the author's trials and tribulations raising his children in Italy, and the discoveries he makes about Italian culture during the process. His occasional tendency to simplistically analyze the reasons behind the actions of his relatives, neighbors and friends might grate on the nerves of some readers (particularly those who dislike any criticism of organized religion), but nonetheless his love and respect for Italy and Italians is clearly visible throughout the book.

In particular, his charming anecdotes describing his vacations with his children while on the Adriatic coast of Italy struck a strong chord with me. His description of the Italian beach scene made me realize why I enjoyed my vacations on the coast of Italy so much. Throughout the rest of the book, some of his other observations and anecdotes brought me to a deeper awareness of what I both love and dislike about Italy, and further gave me a greater insight into the motivations, joys and aspirations of my Italian friends.

I don't know how this book will read if you haven't lived or travelled in Italy, but I would hope that it will give you an appreciation of the wonderful people and culture that I have found here. I read it in one sitting, and afterwards found myself moved to plan yet another expedition into the small beach towns along the coast near my home.

In all, this was certainly a wonderful, perceptive and inspiring book, underscored throughout by the author's wit. His earlier book about his Italian experience was certainly funny, but it didn't amuse nearly as much as this one, perhaps because much of his first book was so clearly intended to amuse. This book is witty, warm and loving at the same time and stood head and shoulders above his previous effort.