La Bella Lingua: My Love Affair with Italian, the World’s Most Enchanting Language by Dianne Hales is the kind of book you want to savor slowly, like a small piece of fine chocolate melting on your tongue; which is why I am writing this review before I have finished the book. I can’t bear to let it end! Dianne has studied the Italian language, both at home in the San Francisco Bay Area and through countless trips to Italy, for more than 25 years. By digging deeply into the secrets of the language, she has amassed a wealth of knowledge about the Italian people and culture, and her passion is infectious.
The luscious sounds of the Italian language (I couldn’t help but try pronouncing the words aloud as I read) and the stories behind them have me hooked. After the first chapter, I ran right over to my computer to look up Italian classes nearby – no joke! I am one quarter Italian, and I have traveled to Italy twice without being able to say more than Ciao and Grazie; it may be about time I learn. Even if you do have experience with Italian, there will doubtless be a few new words and concepts from La Bella Lingua to add to your arsenal. Take, for instance, this tidbit on flirting, Italian style:
“Only Italian distinguishes between a civettino, a precocious boy flattering a pretty woman; a civettone, a boorish lout doing the same; a civettina, an innocent coquette; and a civettuola, a brazen hussy. A giovanotto di prima barba (a boy who starts flirting even before growing a beard) may turn out to be a damerino (dandy), a zerbino (doormat), a zerbinetto (lady-killer), or a zerbinotto (a fop too old for such foolishness). If he becomes a cicisbeo, he joins the long line of Italian men who flagrantly courted married women. I’ve met every one of these varieties over the years.”
In Dianne’s expert hands a grammar lesson becomes an ambrosial experience, and by drawing on the riches of Italian art, history, cooking, literature, film, customs and romance (as well as countless anecdotes from her travels and research), Hales tempts us to fall as madly and deeply in love with Italian as she has.
But what delights me most of all is the sense that Dianne is a woman following her dreams, and that is always a beautiful thing to behold. I will leave you with one last quote, this time from the introduction:
“Somewhere en route to fluency, I turned into Diana, pronounced Dee-anh-aah, and entered a parallel universe where I wear my heels higher and my necklines lower, dance barefoot under the Tuscan moon, and swim in island coves so blue that the Italians say the color twice: azzurro-azzurro.”
You can read an excerpt of La Bella Lingua in this guest post by Dianne Hales on Bleeding Espresso. For more information about Dianne and her work, please visit her website or her fabulous blog.
{images: Dianne Hales}
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