(Oct 4) -
Mark
William Weir (1955-2015)
R.I.P.
Word comes that Mark
Weir passed away the day before
yesterday at his home in England from
complications due to leukemia. Mark was a
lecturer in English at the University of
Naples L'Orientale from
1983 to 2014. Besides teaching, he was
active in the political struggles of
academia to better the lot of foreign
instructors at Italian universities. He was also
one of the best Italian-English
translators in Italy, providing
first-rate translations not just
for large publishers such as the
University of Chicago press and Electa in
Naples, but also in presenting local
culture to visitors. That is, in the old
days there were either no translations in
many museums, or worse, there were bad
ones. Mark took care of that; he was a
fine natural writer, unerringly accurate
in finding a correct phrase and deft in
giving readers the pleasant sensation that
they were reading the original. I am
remiss if I do not mention that Mark was a
musician. He played the viola and sang in
local choirs in Naples. His life was not
just about quality, but beauty —in
teaching, in language, in music. When
that person is torn away, it leaves a
hole in the community. If he was your
friend, it leaves a hole in your
heart. There is
no consolation here —no
"O death, where is thy sting? O
grave, where is thy victory?"—rhetoric
to sooth us at Mark's passing,
except to say, for what it's worth
(and I think it is worth a great
deal), that Mark faced what he had
to face with those values of the
spirit that are the best of what it
means to be a fine human being —grace,
equanimity and courage.
Mark stayed in
Naples for treatment until late in 2014
and then returned home for further
treatment. He was not pessimistic about
the future. He wrote in December, "...Writing
with a complete change of scene: band of
woodland in front of my mother's
cottage, back garden with enough space
to grow things and a good expanse of
sky, bathed in sunlight on my arrival...
I feel here that I really can recoup all
the strength I have." He certainly
had much left to give, but that was not to
be. His colleagues liked and respected
him. He liked his students, and they
intuited perhaps that they were getting
the best that English-language pedagogy
has to offer. They were right. To use a
phrase that often seems trite until you
find someone who fits the bill, Mark was a
gentleman and a scholar. Rest in peace.
(Oct
8) - In progress as of today on
the island of Ischia - a workshop of
the Urban Sketchers, an
organization self-described as
"...dedicated to fostering a global
community of artists who practice
on-location drawing...to raise the
artistic, storytelling and
educational value of on-location
drawing, promoting its practice and
connecting people around the world
who draw on location where they live
and travel." They held their
first symposium in Portland in 2012
and have run a steady stream of
workshops in various places around the
world ever since. Their yearly International Urban
Sketchers Symposium is held in a different city
every year and includes lectures,
activities and workshops taught by
professional educators, architects,
illustrators and artists. The event in
Ischia will be on the premises of the
Aragonese Castle, and the results of
the sketchers' labors will be
displayed on Saturday, Oct. 10 at 6.30
pm. On Sunday, there will be a
collective "Negombo Sketchcrawl"
dedicated to the local artist,
Gabriele Mattera and starting at the
Negombo thermal gardens. Open to all.
The motto of the organization is "See
the world one drawing at a time." I
think "Sketchcrawl" is a pun on
"pubcrawl." Keep upright and drawing.
Sounds like fun.
(Oct 9) - On the Trail of the Lady
Lawyer - I'm an idiot.
This is based on a
longer, detailed item found on the
website of Napoli
Underground (Nug). The
photo (below, right) is also from
NUg, and appears here by kind
concession; there is
additional photography available
at that link. [Note from Nov.
2020 -- the Nug website is no
longer operative.]
First,
about the title (above). Truly, I
mean absolutely no
disrespect. I just enjoy laughing
at my own ignorance and I hereby
give you permission to laugh at me
(as long as you don't roll your
eyes). I'm not Roman Catholic and
did not know that among the many
devotional titles of Mary, the
mother of Jesus, is the term Avvocata
in the sense of "protectress";
indeed, the term "Advocate," while
rare, also appears in English in
the same religious context. The
complete name of the structure in
the photo is Il Santuario di
Maria Santissima dell'Avvocata
[Most Holy Mary, the Advocate].
Unfortunately for me, the word
avvocato (with the
o on the end to
show male gender) is the common
Italian word for "lawyer". A woman
lawyer may be called avvocato
or, possibly, avvocatessa,
but never avvocata [with
the femine -a ending—for
obvious reasons. I mean, she may
have a law degree, but she's not that
good!] But, you see, I didn't
know any of that when I started to
do a recent translation about the
structure shown in the above
image; I just wondered why a lady
lawyer would have her own church!
(Selene reminds me, too, that
there is an entire quarter of
Naples named Avvocata,
named for Mary, Mother of Christ.
That section includes the large
square, Piazza
Dante and part of the long
street that starts there, via
Salvator Rosa.)
With that out of the way, the
trail to that sanctuary is one of
the most scenic along the entire
western coast of the bay of
Salerno. My friends described it
as a "nice hike". It's 13 km out
and back if you return to your
starting point. That's more than
nice; that's 8 miles. BUT, they
say -
...the trail
goes from Cava de'
Tirreni... to the
Sanctuary... The first part
of the trail... is beneath a
ridge of the Lattari
mountains... the trail opens
onto a splendid view of the
sea at the towns of Cetara,
Vietri and Salerno with the
Picentine mountains in the
background...we made
the top of a crest where the
view ranges to Amalfi and the
cobalt blue of the coast so
named. Amalfi dominates the
panorama...
Facing
the sanctuary from the trail (as
shown in the photo) you are facing
SxSW over the Amalfi Coast. If
that appeals to you, and you are
up for a beautiful, strenuous walk
in the hills, by all means, this
is for you, or, as my friends put
it, "This hike is a
must!"
(Oct 11) - The Waterfalls &
Mills of Conca della Campania
My
friends from Napoli Underground (NUg) took
another hike recently, but at quite the
opposite end of Campania from the one
cited directly above. This one was into
the Roccamonfina
Regional Park in the hills above the
north-western end of the Campanian plain
in the rugged coastal mountains between
the Volturno and Gargano rivers. (See the
above link for details of the park and
mountains. It's one of the most
interesting areas in Italy. Really!)
They went to the small town of Conca della
Campania ('Conca' in the upper-left corner
of the image) to have a look at a series
of waterfalls and watermills. Most of the
smaller sites around here have such
treasures that you can find and explore
relatively easily, and Conca is no
exception. The trail is marked. Fulvio (of
NUg) writes in detail of the hike:
"Right
from the beginning of the trail, in
these limestone rocks of the ancient
extinct Roccamonfina volcano, there are
many crevices as well as artificial
caves ripe for exploration...the trail
is well marked by a wooden guide
railing. You'll finally be down at the
upper part of the river...there is a
small stone bridge with barely legible
trail markings that indicate that this
is the entrance to a ring-trail to
everything there is to see on this
excursion: the falls, the water-mills
and various underground spaces...along
that stretch the fragrance of the water
will increase as you get closer to the
falls, and you are soon at a water drop.
...The small waterfall (about 10 meters
in height) drops into a pool, splashing
over on the way down a number of
outcroppings that are apparently part of
an ancient lava block."
Fortunately,
it's not hard to find.
(photo, above: Napoli Underground)
(Oct 12) - The Calore river
-unspoiled, because no
one can find it! (It is NOT one of
the red lines on this map!) This
short entry is based on an item on
the NUg
website here, entitled The
Canyons of the Calore River. I
quote:
...the
Calore has gouged a series of deep
canyons, known in Italian as the
Gorges of the Calore. Due to the
difficulty of accessing this part
of the river, these canyons are
still rough and unspoiled—all the
better for you if like to hike and
go rafting...
Go
ahead, you'll love it (image, left).
That's a guarantee. Please remember,
however, that there are not one, not
two, but three (!) rivers
named Calore in the Campania
region of Italy, alone. One of them
is on this map as #4. It is
technically called the Calore
Beneventano and is the longest and
most commonly known Calore river,
but it is NOT the one you want
unless you want to kayak to
Benevento. (You don't.) Another
Calore flows into the scheme at #3,
which marks the beginning of the
Tanagro river. The Tanagro then
flows NW into the Sele river (#1).
You want what is called the Calore
Lucano (because it is in ancient
Lucania); it runs below the
#3 river starting in the mountains
below the Alburni
massif, and then winds into
the Sele river, which takes all that
water down to the Tyrrhenean Sea at
Paestum. If you can see yourself
Tom-&-Hucking through the photo
(above), this may be for you. If it
is, go to the link at the top of
this item and read about what you
can expect. There are more photos.
Follow directions. You can't miss
it. It's a river, for Pete's sake.
photo above from Napoli
Underground
(Oct 13) - This little fellow and his brother
or sister, or maybe just friend
(I can't tell. If you can, you must be
Charles Darwin) play prominently in a tale
spun to me by Fulvio Salvi called The
Bay of Ieranto and the Unexpected Gift.
Fulvio and friends went hiking and swimming
at that very beautiful bay recently and...
...All
of a sudden a large powerboat accompanied
by an equally outlandish rubber dinghy
hove into view in the bay. We were
surprised at that and even more so to see
a Coast Guard vessel right behind them. We
imagined that some “Sunday sailors” were
about to get a very loud talking to by the
authorities. That didn't happen,
but
something else did. Two turtles were
released onto the beach from the
coastguard vessel. The turtles
were then christened "Tarta" and
"Ruga"...
(Get it? C'mon, think! OK, tartaruga
is Italian for "turtle"). Complete
details on the beautiful Bay of
Jeranto are here.
More info on turtles and efforts to
save them are at this link.
(Oct
21) - This is
pathetic. Heavy rains over the
last few weeks have resulted in
further episodes of Naples' worst
nightmare—cave-ins,
earth slides, anything too much water
can do to a hill, tunnel, street or
building. Part of the via Krupp on Capri
caved in, a large piece of masonry fell
from a building onto via Duomo near the
Naples cathedral, and part of the major
port-side tunnel leading in and out of
the downtown area collapsed, closing
traffic on one side. All this was bad
enough, but then I get to the end of the
article and see this:
It
says, "After reading this article, I
feel..." and you click on the icon that best
represents your feelings. Strange, because
this is clearly directed at people who
probably can't read! What is this pathetic,
infantile, knuckle-dragging, mouth-breathing
nonsense!? (Did I say I didn't like it?)
Didn't we spend many centuries convincing
ourselves that there was real writing beyond
cuneiform? Maybe alphabets with which we
could express ourselves? Now we are back in
the caves, except that they were better
artists. Actually, there is an
emoticon I could direct at the publishers of
this cyber-rag, but it doesn't display the
proper finger.
(Oct 28) - The
National
Archaeological
Museum of
Naples
is cramped, as is
evident to anyone who
has visited it; yet,
what has traditionally
been on display is less
than one-half of what could
be on display with
adequate space and, as
usual, money. So they
store the rest. I still don't know where the
fabled warehouses of the museum are (nor
does anyone I have ever asked—
including cops!). Whatever the
case, at least the storage units
have come out of hiding a bit with
a new exhibit at the museum called
Beni culturali invisibili
[Invisible Cultural Heritage].
Ninety (!) statues, busts and
inscriptions from ancient
Herculaneum, Pompeii, Cuma,
Pozzuoli and Baia have been
dusted off and put into a new
glass, plexiglass and steel wing
of the museum. (It's only
partially finished but should be
done in 2016 and will include a
library and a
theater.)
photo: Paolo de Luca, la
Repubblica
(Oct 29) - Larry Ray of
Gulfport, Mississippi, was a
longtime resident of Naples and
maintains a presence on Naples:
Life, Death & Miracles
at this link— lots of good
stuff (c'mon, he met Lucky
Luciano!) He has just sent
me one of the most charming
photos I have even seen (pictured, Larry
is the one in the blue shirt). He
included this note:
I find joy in the
little delights, like rearing (for the
past two weeks) Monarch caterpillars on my
lovely Milkweed plants then giving then a
nice safe place to do their metamorphic
magic, and yesterday Monarch butterfly #1
popped out of its chrysalis, hung around
on my finger and on my shirt for about
fifteen minutes, then off it went. It is
completing a four-stage life cycle by
leaving my finger, finding some food and
then flying nonstop across the Gulf of
Mexico to that grove of trees in the
highlands where it and several million
other Monarchs will overwinter, then make
new Monarchs who will fly back eventually
to Canada to carry on and repeat the
amazing routine. This is the second year I
have done this.
I like the
idea of "...that grove of trees in the
highlands." We should all have one.
(Nov
3) - Sabrina,
thou shouldst be living at
this hour! The last time I
wrote about the Naples Zoo,
it was here,
on the death of Sabrina, the
only elephant (the solitude
alone is probably what killed
her). My other entries on the
zoo:
Zoo, Naples(1) (2)
(3)
(4).
They redepress me when I read
them. Perhaps this time around,
things are looking up, and it's
about time.The Zoo website
announces "Great Expectations
lead to Grand Surpises" in the
form of mother and daughter,
Wini and Julia (48 and 23 years
old, respectively), newly
arrived from Copenhagen (at
least it's warmer in Naples!).
Their Danish keeper arrived with
them, so as not to make the
change too abrupt. They have a
new elephant house, green grass,
a huge water pool, trees to
scratch on and about one acre to
roam around in. It doesn't seem
like much, but it is, after all,
a zoo. This addition to the zoo
comes through an organization
known as EAZA
(European Association of Zoos
and Aquaria, founded in 1992),
headquartered in Amsterdam. They
say in their promo literature
that ". ..zoos and
aquaria have a strong role to
play in protecting nature and
wildlife both at our
institutions and out...". That
is shorthand for the plausible
and unfortunate scenario that in
a world intent on making wild
animals extinct,* maybe
the only way to shelter and
protect them is in captivity.
The organization is an umbrella
for specialist groups such as
the European Endangered Species
Programs and various other
breeding programs. The Naples
Zoo, in its literature, says
that some of the facilities are
not yet fully open because they
are being restructured. Also,
the former co-management scheme
with the adjacent
funfair/amusement park
"Edenlandia" is still uncertain
since that facility is still
closed (it has announced that it
will reopen in six months). What
can I say? If they don't give
these two beautiful creatures
(whom John Donne called, "Nature's
great masterpiece...the only
harmless great thing")
a fair deal, I am going to go
down and release the kraken!
(Actually, that thing, probably
Architeuthis dux,
lives at the Dohrn
Aquarium in Naples, a
facility in good standing of the
EAZA! So be
warned...)
* (If you think
that is an exaggeration,
perhaps this
external link
will convince you.)
(Nov 8) - Yesterday Neapolitan artist,
Selene Salvi, a good friend to me and this
website, gave me this lovely painting you
see on the right (a gallery of some of her
other works is here). I
had a few questions: Who is it? and, of
course (as with all art!), What does it
mean? Number 1 - I am more than a bit
prosopagnostic (I could start a church,
but I am content just asking the stranger
in the mirror every morning what he is
doing in my bathroom), so I wasn't sure if
it was a self-portrait. I asked, but she
is being coy and has not replied. It
looked vaguely religious (sad upturned
eyes) - maybe Mary, the mother of Christ?
I turned the canvas over and read the
name: Cassandra. To refresh your
memory (because you know that I didn't
have to look any of this up!), in Greek
mythology Cassandra was the daughter of
Priam, king of Troy. She was given the
gift of prophecy by Apollo, the god of
everything that was refined, serene and
disciplined. He wooed her. She rejected
him, and he did something very unrefined,
unserene and undisciplined —downright
vindictive, you might say: he saw to it
that no one would ever believe her
prophecies. Today a "Cassandra" is anyone
with the wisdom of prophecy, but who is
ignored by those who might most need her
counsel. That brings me to number 2: What
does the painting mean in the sense of Why
did she give it to me? Have I been
ignoring portentous warning signs? Am I
doomed? Is some psycho-social equivalent
of climate change about to swamp me?
Probably yes, yes and yes, but I'll ask
her. But she might side-step the question.
Maybe I could ask that guy in the mirror.
(next day) - Whew!
Relieved. Selene tells me she has no bad
news for me. She says that...
...In
his poem Alexandra,
the Greek poet, Lycophron, imagines the
prophetess imprisoned in a dark but
uncovered cell from which she recounts
her own life and the lives of those who
have been and who are to come. Her
immense knowledge is equaled only by her
infinite loneliness. It is a figure that
has always appealed to me.
[The poem Alexandra is also
called Cassandra.] [Selene Salvi,
has a page of her paintings here.]
This is
the end of Miscellany page #56
(Sept 20) - Not a very nice way to spend the last days of summer out on the bay of Naples. The 32-meter wooden yacht, the Angra, belonging to Aurelio De Laurentiis, president of the Napoli football club, caught fire at 6 p.m. just off the Posillipo coast near the Mergellina harbor. He, his wife and children, and all crew members —12 persons in all— all sprang into the sea where they were rescued by other pleasure craft. There were no injuries. This kind of spooked me because I saw it clearly from a street-side cafè about 100 meters up the hillside. I think this will be the last entry of my Boats of the Bay series, at least for the year.
(Sept 22) - Pre-Roman era tomb discovered at Pompeii. In spite of the difficulties of doing archaeology at Pompeii (noted here and here in two recent entries), this second most visited archaeological site in Italy (after the Colosseum, in Rome) continues to reward researchers. With most attention going deservedly to preserving Roman Pompeii, we forget the layers that lie beneath, from the days before mighty Rome existed. The Jean Berard Center in Naples has now announced the discovery of a well-preserved Samnite tomb at Pompeii. It contains a woman's skeleton and many amphorae. The Samnites were ferocious enemies of the Romans; they fought each other for centuries for control of central Italy, with the Samnites eventually succumbing in 100 BC. At one time, Samnite influence extended from the Adriatic to the Tyrrhenean and included the area where Roman Pompeii would later stand. This particular tomb is from the fourth century BC. The Jean Berard Center in Naples has served since 1966 as a "Documentation Center of historical research on Southern Italy", "a research platform for French and Italian teams working in Southern Italy and Sicily with a focus on Magna Grecia,the Greek colonization in the West. The center's current facilities in Naples include equipment depots, specialized laboratories, a library and as reception space for visiting researchers.