Rome, Naples and Florence

Few writers have known Italy better than Stendhal: he was only seventeen when he first rode south across the Alps in the wake of Napoleons armies, and he continued to travel and to live in Italy until a few months before his death. Some of his visits lasted only a few weeks, others continued for years, and he spent the last decade of his life as French Consul in Civitavecchia yet he was never a tourist in the ordinary sense of the word. Italy, for Stendhal, was never a mere treasure trove of ruins, museums and galleries: it was the life of the country which fascinated him, its spirit, the inner workings of its heart and mind. This picture or rather this living dream of Italy he created is as fresh and tantalizing today as it was almost two centuries ago.