La Bella Lingua: My Love Affair With Italian, The World's Most Enchanting Language (2009) - Plot & Excerpts
A personal enthusiasm toward the languageI started reading the book with all my enthusiasm about the Italian culture, but I am struggling on moving forward. There are too many Italian words and phrases among the text, which I have no idea to understand although she gave translation sometimes. I know this book is all about the Language but filling every page with foreign words which could only puzzle me and reduce my passion to continue my reading. Maybe it is my poor English, I find it hard to understand how the author construct the content.Sometimes, half of the paragraph is away from the main topic. Obviously, the author loves Italian the language and the culture so much, but there is no need to give praise or show her own enthusiasm in every page. It seems the author couldn't wait to show off how good she knows the language and how fevered her enthusiasm is.I am reading another book about two Brits' new life in Spain at the same time. Conversely, the author managed to give some idea about daily and simple Spanish,the Spanish culture and funny stories, which is much easier to go compared with this one. It might be my fault to start this book with the hope of understanding the life and culture in Italy rather than the language, but I can not be interested in the author's own love toward the language anyway. Not the easiest book to get through, meaning, I could only take it one chapter at a time before having to put it down. I guess it had to do with the fact that this was a "learning" book. I learned a lot about Italy and it's history from these 13 chapters. The author does a nice job dabbing into the various identities of Italy. It's not all about the language. I liked how it was broken up into topics (arts, cooking, music, etc.). I am glad I opted for Spanish and German as a second language b/c Italian is a very complex language.
What do You think about La Bella Lingua: My Love Affair With Italian, The World's Most Enchanting Language (2009)?
This book is a love song to the Italian language and Italian culture. Loved reading it!
—moria8
AMAZING!!! She echoes my sentiments! A must read for all lovers of Italian culture!
—ehawk94
