Italy Out of Hand: A Capricious Tour [Hardcover]

Barbara Hodgson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: March 2005

With its genius for art and culture, there is no country in the world as wonderfully civilized (and civilizing) as Italy. But seething below this surface is a long and shadowy history of corruption, cruelty, and the generally bizarre. For centuries it has been overrun by waves of invaders, all contributing their own questionable bits of culture, and all wantonly adding to the confusion. So, how is a poor visitor supposed to make sense of this anarchic place? Co-creator of the cult favorite Paris Out of Hand, Barbara Hodgson has neatly brushed away the chaos and assembled an eclectic treasury of forgotten and overlooked oddities: long-lost popes, bloodthirsty mercenaries, tempestuous artists, and inexplicable follies. Italy Out of Hand is not a traditional guidebook, with hotel addresses and hours of operation. Rather, it is an idiosyncratic tour of a country that is too overwhelming and extravagant for most of us to comprehend without a little guidance. Illustrated with an equally eclectic selection of photographs, portraits, and art, Italy Out of Hand is the perfect companion for those who like their truths to be stranger than fiction.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Barbara Hodgson is a Vancouver-based writer, photographer, and designer. She is the author of the acclaimed illustrated novels The Sensualist (0-8118-3208-2), Hippolyte's Island (0-8118-2892-1), The Tattooed Map (0-8118-0817-3), and Lives of Shadows (0-8118-3926-5) as well as collaborator on Paris Out of Hand (0-8118-0969-2).

Product Details

• Hardcover: 208 pages
• Publisher: Chronicle Books (March 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0811831469
• ISBN-13: 978-0811831468
• Product Dimensions: 6.6 x 5.2 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #717,887 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Just a great little book..., July 12, 2007

By 

Barb - Arizona "irishone" (Lake Havasu City) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Italy Out of Hand: A Capricious Tour (Hardcover)

This book caught my eye because it looks old and very Italian. I bought it for my husband's birthday and he loved it. In turn, he bought the book for his nephew. This book is part travelog, part nostalgia - just a book to treasure. Whether you're Italian or not, the feel of the book will make you wish more modern day authors would format their books with originality and flair. Today, a book is a book is a book. Hooray for this author!

8 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Different, but ultimately not all that great, May 28, 2007

By 

Thomas B. Gross (Winchester, MA USA) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Italy Out of Hand: A Capricious Tour (Hardcover)

I love reading guidebooks - to Italy in particular, and bought this book in part because, quite frankly, I couldn't quite figure out what this book was exactly from the description on Amazon and the previous reviews.

"Italy Out of Hand" is a small, nicely and heavily bound book, reminiscent in its physical attributes of a Folio Society Edition. It would make a nice gift for any Bibliophile interested in Italy.

It is not a guidebook that most people will want to take to Italy with them. For one thing, given its size, it's simply too heavy and unfortunately literally not worth its weight in useful information. It will look nice in your bookshelf at home but not something you want to lug around in your suitcase.

Most of the information, such as it is, can be found in more detail and more lucid prose in the latest edition of "Frommer's Italy." There's very little here that experienced visitors to Italy will find new, and what is "new" is often pointless and lacks interesting detail: "So-and-so was the notorious son of the famous so-and-so who traveled to Egypt with So-and-so who became the Duchess of Orsino" or something like that.

The book particularly lacks information pertinent to Italy today. I got the impression that the author relied heavily on 19th-century travel guides and the novels of Stendhal for information. For a book about Italy, there is very little information about food, and hardly anything about life outside of the major cities.

8 of 11 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An Italy Lover's Delight! - A Book-Lover's Book!, May 31, 2006

By 

William Hart "Anamorphic OAR Fan" (Fullerton, California) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Italy Out of Hand: A Capricious Tour (Hardcover)

Adding this slim volume to the over 350 books on Italy in my collection, might seem like a very small drop in the over-flowing bucket of delights I already have to entertain myself with; but the pleasure I derived from the sheer book-lover's joy at receiving such a beautiful volume, caused me to have to immediately write a public "Thank You!" for this creation by Barbara Hodgson.

I fell in love with Italy many years ago while on a business trip; and later when I took my family there to explore over 2100 miles of the country over a period of weeks, they were also captivated by this incredible timeless land.

"Italy Out of Hand: A Capricious Tour", takes us all to some of our favorite places (in our hearts and minds, at least), and more that will become our favorites too, when we return again to "Bella Italia".

Again, Thank You Barbara Hodgson, for a wonderful treat, for a fairly jaded book-buyer! Will Hart