In the never-ending series “Emily reads a book about the place she’s going to,” I checked Tim Parks’ Italian Ways out of the library, assuming it would be a typical travel memoir. Oh, how wrong I was. Within the first few pages, I realized that my habit of checking out books without finding out what they’re about had steered me towards something totally unexpected: a book, not about Italy, but about Italian trains. And once again, removing the possible skepticism from my book-choosing process was rewarded, when I discovered one of the most insightful books about Italian culture and living I’ve ever read.
Parks is a long-time Italian resident, and as someone who lives in a city where he does not work, he is exceedingly familiar with the Italian train system. In this book, he uses the culture of trains – everything from where to sit to how you talk to other people on the train to the Kafkaesque methods of buying tickets – as a way to examine the Italian mindset and culture up close. Walking the line between insider and outsider, Parks takes the reader on a journey through his own experiences, mistakes, missteps, and even yelling matches. The result is a book that paints a portrait of a country through its rail system.
It’s like Peter Mayle but in Italy on trains. It’s like having an anthropologist take you by the hand and tell you the story of a culture through anecdotes. I feel like I’m doing a bad job of this, so all I can do is beseech you: if you have even a passing interest in Italy, read this book. You will not regret it.