Author Archives: Erika Bizzarri

One of the most moving accounts of the past and memories is Tony Judt’s Memory Chalet. Succumbing to Lou Gherig’s disease, he gradually could live only within himself, within his memory. There he could relive the story of his life, a life that had moved through space and time, now captured in those countless roomsContinue reading “Memory One”

Camilleri. Thanks to Camilleri, his police inspector Montalbano and the small Sicilian town of Vigàta have become what might be called household words. Albeit the town so familiar to the devotees of the mystery series shown on television is a collage of various Sicilian towns, there is no real town by that name. Although CamilleriContinue reading “The Voice of the Violin”

I know I’ve written about the Blue Bar and its owner before, but this is a bit different. Besides which I have also discovered that he spells his name Antonny. For someone who has never frequented coffee bars (or any other type of bar), just to hang out and wile away the time, my relationshipContinue reading “Antonny and the Blue Bar”

A memorable cat. Her name was Thelma although I never did find out why my granddaughter chose that name, presumably thinking of Thelma and Louise. Over the years there was no dearth of cats in the family. Cats of all colors, from black to white to grey tigers. They had a variety of names: RadicchioContinue reading “Thelma”

It can get complicated when you have more than one friend with the same name. I’ve solved the problem by calling them James 1, James 2, and James 3. James 1. The meeting with my first James goes back to the 1970s in Florence when he was a student in my art history class.  MostContinue reading “My Three James”

Further thoughts on the book Pages flutter through the years. Their time-worn state betrays the fact that they were loved, meant something. Woe to a book, to a life untouched by time. The written word. Once impressed in clay, meant to be permanent. On papyrus, on parchment, paper, too easily devoured by fire. Now onContinue reading “Further Thoughts II”

The book. A repository of words, reflections, reduced with time to torn and mangled dog-eared pages. Ideas, words, thoughts on the verge of disintegrating. Set in print Before it is too late. What we had once thought ineffaceable gives way to that fugacious vocal surrogate, no sooner said than gone.  Before it is too late.Continue reading “Before it is too Late”

Sometimes one must be alone. Which however is not the same as being lonely. Loneliness is commonly defined as “A state of solitude or being alone” or the “perception of being alone and isolated”. Basically, it is “a state of mind” when one no longer finds meaning in one’s life. Loneliness seems to be aContinue reading “Loneliness”

Objects have souls and stories of their own. In 1794 when he was confined to his room, Xvier de Maistre wiled away the time by entering into conversations with those not so mute objects he encountered.. And in1933, Louise Bogan also undertook a journey round her room. Since I have no intention of writing aContinue reading “Four Objects”

SCARVES, STOLES, SHAWLS OR WRAPS Stole, shawl, cape, boa, or pashmina. Or, perhaps, if you go back far enough, you get to toga. When I was working on a translation of Saint Charles Borromeo’s manual on church building and decoration, a stole was a liturgical vestment, on a par with a chasuble and surplice, andContinue reading “Stoles”

What’s in a scarf? Well, a lot really. Like the objects on my dresser. They have a soul. And come to think of it so do those squares or rectangles of printed fabric known generically as scarves. They can be time machines. They can be stores of memories, with ramifications as to when and whereContinue reading “Scarves”

I detest throwing things away. Aside from useful things, like receipts and medical tests, often I keep things just because, well just because they are beautiful. They may not be original drawings, they may be details of paintings, they may be something that reminds me of the past like a card with illustrations of theContinue reading “The Letter N”

And then there is another generation – skipping one. Although the generation that skipped, that of my son, did cross the ocean several times, it never settled down there, was never permanent. The last generation to cross the ocean, once more east to west as her great-great ancestors had done, is my granddaughter.  The newContinue reading “One More”

How little we really know. The portrait of a lovely young woman on a shelf near my bedroom is of Jennie, my grandmother. I knew a bit about her life, but it had never occurred to me to ask myself whether she was happy; I had not wondered what was going on in her mind.Continue reading “Was Jennie Happy?”

Then there were the women, my ancestors, on my mother’s side. Some of whom also crossed the ocean. My other grandmother, my mother’s mother, had been shuttled across the ocean as a child but was then brought back to her native land, Germany, to be brought up by an uncle. When she was old enough,Continue reading “Some Amazing Women Part II”

One reads every day of the amazing courage of those who are fleeing Afghanistan, Ukraine, and other countries that are repressive or torn apart by war. Yet in their own way, for their time and place, the women who were my ancestors were also amazing. I cannot help but wonder what induced a young womanContinue reading “Some Amazing Women Part I”

Mute spies.In plain sight. Laundry strung from house to house, half human shapes projected on poles out into the street. Sweaters and dresses flapping down, skins stretched out to dry. Dante’s Inferno. The twisted souls of sheets. A revealing, a revelation, of what the city on the whole keeps out of sight. Conceals but ultimatelyContinue reading “Mute Spies”