Feriae Augusti!
The Week in Italy will be back on 29 August
Dear readers — it’s that time of year again when everything in Italy grinds to a halt. It’s 40 degrees outside today. The restaurants and bars and shops are starting to shut their doors and “chiuso per ferie” signs are ubiquitous. Trains are chronically delayed, wild fires are raging and the beaches are filling up.
Italy’s parliament closes next week and the MPs are heading off for their summer breaks. Newspapers, in turn, have largely suspended normal coverage to focus on trashy paparazzi adjacent features. This afternoon, reading La Nazione, I learnt that Giorgia Meloni will be heading to Ceglie Messapica in Puglia - “an excellent and classy choice” in case you were wondering. Elly Schlein, meanwhile, is apparently going to “ruin your summer” by campaigning up and down the country’s beaches. So do watch out for that… ;)
I’m also going offline for a while. This year I’m heading down to Sicily to spend the Ferragosto break between Palermo, Ustica and Levanzo; reading, writing, swimming, and catching up on sleep.
Because it’s going to be a busy autumn.
The harvest season, the vendemmia, will be big business as ever after the break, so wine and olive oil themed festivities will be the name of the game in many parts of the country. The Venice film festival will get the cultural calendar back in full swing on 7 September and I’m particularly excited for the premiere of Luca Guadagnino’s Queer (adapted from the novel of the same name by William Burroughs).
In politics, the government will return from the recess in full blown campaign mode, aiming to galvanize more public support for a controversial constitutional reform, which would see the public directly elect the Prime Minister, as well as the so-called autonomia differenziata initiative, which will radically re-define the competencies of regional administration. One thing’s for sure: the protests are going to be spirited.
But enough of that for now. I’ll be back on 29 August with a deeper look at all of the above and more. Until then let me wish you all a restorative break, free from PD harassment - indeed any kind of harassment - wherever you happen to be pitching your umbrella this summer.
A presto e buone vacanze!
Jamie
I’m Jamie Mackay, a UK-born, Italy-based writer, working at the interfaces of journalism, criticism, poetry, fiction, philosophy, travelogue and cultural-history. I set up ‘The Week in Italy’ to make a space to share a regular overview of the debates and dilemmas, innovations and crises that sometimes pass under the radar of our overcrowded news feeds, to explore politics, current affairs, books, arts and food. If you’re a regular reader, and you enjoy these updates, I hope you’ll consider becoming a supporter for EUR 5.00 per month. I like to think of it as a weekly catch-up chat over an espresso. Alternatively, if you’d like to send a one-off something, you can do so via PayPal using this link. Grazie!