This unique guide to one of today’s hottest tourist destinations combines fascinating articles by a wide variety of writers, woven throughout with the editor’s own indispensable advice and opinions—providing in one package an unparalleled experience of an extraordinary place. This edition on Tuscany and Umbria features: ● Articles, interviews, recipes, and quotes from writers, visitors, residents, and experts on the region, including Frances Mayes, Mario Batali, Erica Jong, Barbara Ohrbach, Faith Willinger, and David Leavitt. ● In-depth pieces about Florence and the hill towns of Tuscany and Umbria that illuminate the simple pleasures of local cuisine, the dazzling art treasures of the Uffizi, the civilized wilderness of Tuscan back roads, the many varieties of olive oil, the endearing quirks of the Italian character, and much more. ● Enticing recommendations for further reading, including novels, histories, memoirs, coookbooks, and guidebooks. ● An A–Z Miscellany of concise and entertaining information on everything from biscotti to Super-Tuscan wine, from the history of the Medicis to traveling with children. ● Spotlights on unusual shops, restaurants, hotels, and experiences not to be missed. ● More than a hundred black-and-white photographs and illustrations.

Not since Mark Twain invaded Europe in Innocents Abroad has travel been so much fun, as we follow The Clean Plate Club through the daily ritual of morning coffee, frequent gelato, pranzo and cena. Punctuated by visits into museums, churches, and countless stores, in search of the Holy Bargain. Filled with humor, love, and an amazing number of incredibly helpful travel tips-- and more than a few cautionary traveler's misadventures. An irreverent, rollicking-and totally accurate-depiction of travel throughout Italy-loving every moment of it.

Opera is the fastest growing of all the performing arts, attracting audiences of all ages who are enthralled by the gorgeous music, vivid drama, and magnificent production values. If you've decided that the time has finally come to learn about opera and discover for yourself what it is about opera that sends your normally reserved friends into states of ecstatic abandon, this is the book for you. Opera 101 is recognized as the standard text in English for anyone who wants to become an opera lover--a clear, friendly, and truly complete handbook to learning how to listen to opera, whether on the radio, on recordings, or live at the opera house. Fred Plotkin, an internationally respected writer and teacher about opera who for many years was performance manager of the Metropolitan Opera, introduces the reader (whatever his or her level of musical knowledge) to all the elements that make up opera, including: A brief, entertaining history of opera; An explanation of key operatic concepts, from vocal types to musical conventions; Hints on the best way to approach the first opera you attend and how to best understand what is happening both offstage and on; Lists of recommended books and recordings, and the most complete traveler's guide to opera houses around the world. The major part of Opera 101 is devoted to an almost minute-by-minute analysis of eleven key operas, ranging from Verdi's thunderous masterpiece Rigoletto and Puccini's electrifying Tosca through works by Mozart, Donizetti, Rossini, Offenbach, Tchaikovsky, and Wagner, to the psychological complexities of Richard Strauss's Elektra. Once you have completed Opera 101, you will be prepared to see and hear any opera you encounter, thanks to this book's unprecedentedly detailed and enjoyable method of revealing the riches of opera.

The words of Frances Mayes, William Weaver, and Jason Epstein give readers a taste of life in the countrysides of Tuscany and Umbria in this inspired anthology and travel resource, while the second part of the book is a handy reference section of information that travelers need to know.

Henry James’s travel writings are at once literary masterpieces, unsurpassed guidebooks and penetrating reflections on the international themes familiar from his fiction. This volume, the second of two, begins with the classic A Little Tour in France (1900), illustrated with Joseph Pennell’s exquisite drawings from the original edition. James begins his tour of the French countryside one rainy morning in mid-September of 1882, when he sets off for the city of Tours as a means of exploring the proposition that “though France might be Paris, Paris was by no means France.” From Tours, Balzac’s birthplace, James travels to the great chateaux of the Loire Valley, visiting Chambord, Amboise, Chenonceaux, and Blois, where, as you cross the threshold, “you step straight into the sunshine and storm of the French Renaissance.” Dense with literary associations and historical echoes, James’s prose brings castles and cathedrals and old walled towns to life. In his glancingly precise visual evocations of terrain and cityscape, he realizes his ambition “to sketch without a palette or brushes.” Henry James loved Italy, “a beautiful disheveled nymph” to England’s “good married matron.” The incisive and witty essays in Italian Hours (1909) describe memorably happy sojourns in Venice, Rome, and Florence, and excursions to Siena, Assisi, Perugia, Capri, Ravenna, and other Italian cities. “Nowhere do art and life seem so interfused” as in Venice, wrote James in celebration of the splendor of Venetian light and color, air, and history. He records his radiant impressions of Roman churches and aqueducts, museums and fountains, and rambles through the gardens of the Villa Borghese in spring, when Rome seems lighted “with an irresistible smile.” All these essays are filled with James’s intense pleasure in Italian places and people. This volume concludes with sixteen essays on such varied places as Switzerland, Holland, Rheims, and the Pyrénées, including a memorable account of the American volunteer ambulance corps in Europe during World War One. LIBRARY OF AMERICA is an independent nonprofit cultural organization founded in 1979 to preserve our nation’s literary heritage by publishing, and keeping permanently in print, America’s best and most significant writing. The Library of America series includes more than 300 volumes to date, authoritative editions that average 1,000 pages in length, feature cloth covers, sewn bindings, and ribbon markers, and are printed on premium acid-free paper that will last for centuries.

This unique guide to one of today’s hottest tourist destinations combines fascinating articles by a wide variety of writers, woven throughout with the editor’s own indispensable advice and opinions—providing in one package an unparalleled experience of an extraordinary place. This edition on Tuscany and Umbria features: ● Articles, interviews, recipes, and quotes from writers, visitors, residents, and experts on the region, including Frances Mayes, Mario Batali, Erica Jong, Barbara Ohrbach, Faith Willinger, and David Leavitt. ● In-depth pieces about Florence and the hill towns of Tuscany and Umbria that illuminate the simple pleasures of local cuisine, the dazzling art treasures of the Uffizi, the civilized wilderness of Tuscan back roads, the many varieties of olive oil, the endearing quirks of the Italian character, and much more. ● Enticing recommendations for further reading, including novels, histories, memoirs, coookbooks, and guidebooks. ● An A–Z Miscellany of concise and entertaining information on everything from biscotti to Super-Tuscan wine, from the history of the Medicis to traveling with children. ● Spotlights on unusual shops, restaurants, hotels, and experiences not to be missed. ● More than a hundred black-and-white photographs and illustrations.

Each edition of this unique series marries a collection of previously published essays with detailed practical information, creating a colorful and deeply absorbing pastiche of opinions and advice. Each book is a valuable resource -- a compass of sorts -- pointing vacationers, business travelers, and readers in many directions. Going abroad with a Collected Traveler edition is like being accompanied by a group of savvy and observant friends who are intimately familiar with your destination. This edition on Paris features: Distinguished writers, such as Mavis Gallant, Barbara Grizzuti Harrison, Herbert Gold, Olivier Bernier, Richard Reeves, Patricia Wells, Catharine Reynolds, and Gerald Asher, who share seductive pieces about Parisian neighborhoods, personalities, the Luxembourg Gardens, Père-Lachaise and other monuments, restaurants and wine bars, le Plan de Paris, and le Beaujolais Nouveau. Annotated bibliographies for each section with recommendations for related readings. An A-Z "renseignements pratiques" (practical information) section covering everything from accommodations, marches aux puces (flea markets), and money to telephones, tipping, and the VAT. Whether it's your first trip or your tenth, the Collected Traveler books are indispensable, and meant to be the first volumes you turn to when planning your journeys.