About the Author: John Hooper
Librarian Note: There is more than one author in the Goodreads database with this name.
John Hooper is currently the Rome correspondent for the Economist and the Guardian. Born in 1950, Hooper was educated at St Benedict’s Abbey in London and St Catharine’s College, Cambridge. At the age of eighteen, he travelled to Biafra during the Nigerian civil war to make a television documentary. Since then, he has spent more than 20 years as a foreign correspondent, working for - among others - the Economist, the Guardian, the Observer, BBC, NBC and Reuters. For several years in London, he was a presenter of BBC World Service’s ‘Twenty Four Hours’ current affairs programme.
For three years, he covered Spain’s eventful transformation from a dictatorship into a democracy. That posting and another, from 1988 to 1994, produced two books on Spain for Penguin, The Spaniards, which won the Allen Lane award for 1987, and its successor, The New Spaniards.
In 1997, he uncovered the so-called “ship of death†migrant trafficking disaster and was a member of the award-winning Observer team that investigated its aftermath.
Find the best price forThe Italians
John Hooper
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Paperback, Published in Jan 2016 by Penguin Books
ISBN10: 014312840X | ISBN13: 9780143128403
Page count: 316
Washington Post bestseller
Los Angeles Times bestseller
A vivid and surprising portrait of the Italian people from an admired foreign correspondent
How did a nation that spawned the Renaissance also produce the Mafia? And why does Italian have twelve words for coat hanger but none for hangover?
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John Hooper’s entertaining and perceptive new book is the ideal companion for anyone seeking to understand contemporary Italy and the unique character of the Italians. Fifteen years as a foreign correspondent based in Rome have sharpened Hooper’s observations, and he looks at the facts that lie behind the stereotypes, shedding new light on everything from the Italians’ bewildering politics to their love of life and beauty. Hooper persuasively demonstrates the impact of geography, history, and tradition on many aspects of Italian life, including football and Freemasonry, sex, food, and opera. Brimming with the kind of fascinating—and often hilarious—insights unavailable in guidebooks, The Italians will surprise even the most die-hard Italophile.
From the Hardcover edition.
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