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The City of Falling Angels

by John Berendt

3.39 · rating details · 5,040 ratings · 973 reviews

The author of the record-breaking bestseller Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil unveils the enigmatic Venice as only he can

Twelve years ago, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil exploded into a monumental success, residing a record-breaking four years on the New York Times bestseller list (longer than any work of fiction or nonfiction had before) and turning John...more

Paperback, 414 pages

Published September 26th 2006 by Penguin (Non-Classics) (first published January 1st 2000)

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Lists with This Book

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The City of Falling Angels by John Berendt

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4th out of 135 books — 40 voters

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Community Reviews

(showing 1-30 of 7,881)

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Jul 25, 2007

El rated it

Shelves: cultural-studies-and-other, true-crime

Written by the same man who wrote Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, this book takes the reader to Venice shortly after the well-renowned Fenice Theatre burned down. Berendt offers a multiple of theories surrounding the fire, from Mafia participation to a neglectful renovation crew.

There are few cohesive lines through this book. There is the mystery surrounding the fire of the Fenice, and there are gossipy stories involving many of the locals (most of whom are actually expatr...more

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Nov 13, 2007

Denise rated it

Recommends it for: everyone

This book is actually one I like to read again and again. John Berendt is a former magazine writer and his first book "Midnight In The Garden of Good And Evil" was a fascinating peek at Savannah society as well as a peek inside the judicial system - following trials of Jim Williams for murder - tried multiple times for the same murder and acquitted each time.

"The City of Falling Angels" turns it attention to the ancient Italian city of Venice, and the tragic fir...more

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Mar 11, 2008

LJ rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: male_author, non_fiction, italy, contemporary_post_1945

THE CITY OF FALLING ANGELS (Non-Fiction-Venice, Italy-Cont) – VG+
Berendt, John – Standalone
The Penguin Press, 2005, US Hardcover – ISBN: 1594200580

First Sentence: “Everyone in Venice is acting,” Count Girolamo Marcello told me.

In January 1996, La Fenice (the Phoenix) was destroyed by fire. Was it an accident, or was it arson? Berendt’s book is a non-fiction look at more than the investigation, but a true study of the history, culture and people of Venice. ...more

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Mar 18, 2009

Suzanne rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: nonfiction, travel, art-painting-sculpture

I love Berendt's style of writing and this is very well done. Like his previous nonfictional work, "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil" the author takes an event, (this time the fire at the Fenice, the Venice Opera House in 1996) investigates it and creates a story he, as the author, and we the reader, all become intrigued by. As always there is a memorable cast of characters. Like Savannah in his previous work, Venice takes on its own identity and that is critical to the plot....more

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Sep 12, 2008

Natalie rated it

I started this book a few months ago, loved it, continued reading it, continued loving it, then put it down for a few months before ever finishing it. Hmm. The problem with the book is, although it paints a vivid picture of Venice, it doesn’t grab the reader like Berendt’s previous book, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. Something about a burnt-down opera house just doesn’t excite the same tension and thrills that good old fashioned homicide does. As travel writing, City of Falling An...more

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Jul 29, 2008

Sparrow rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction, punching-tour, reviewed

Berendt is a very patient writer, which to me is neither a compliment or an insult. I listened to this on audio because I think Holter Graham is an excellent reader, and I think I liked the book, too. Large sections of it only loosely tied into the main story of the burning of Teatro La Fenice, Venice's opera house. Often, however these digressions were more interesting to me than the central story. For example, the story of Ezra Pound's papers was very compelling to me, probably because I h...more

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Jul 15, 2007

RJ rated it

Shelves: recommend

An American walks around Venice trying to explain its peculiarities. He has access very few other Americans would be granted--Unfortunately who comes out looking odd here, in my opinion, is the other Americans expatriates who call the place home. The Ezra Pound and Save Venice incidents largely involve dubious Americans with huge egos that need stroking. The absurdities are worth reading about particularly if you are aware of NYC socialites whose names are within the book.

I enjoye...more

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Jul 17, 2009

Tisha rated it

Shelves: travel, non-fiction, 101-to-read-before-i-die, all-things-italian

John Berendt wonderfully digs beneath the surface of Venice in The City of Falling Angels.. He provides much history of not only the art and buildings of Venice, but also of many Venetian families. He manages to do this all in such a casual way that one forgets it's non-fiction. I'm only sorry, I didn't read this prior to visiting Venice.

One of my favorite lines in the book, describing Venice:

“On one occasion I set about testing this notion by concocting a game called “p...more

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Jul 15, 2007

Andie rated it

Need to reread this one again. I picked up this book and bought it mainly because of my first memory of Venice. It was October of 1997 during my honeymoon and my husband and I had just arrived and were trying to find our Venetian hotel. We were wandering aimlessly through the small passageways and streets of Venice up and over canals; we were hopelessy lost, and we stumbled upon the ruins of La Fenice. The famed opera house had burned in January, 1996 but there had been no change to the site si...more

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Jan 08, 2009

Susan rated it

Venice is the city of falling angels—literally carvings falling off of buildings, possibly on your head if you weren’t careful. The main focus of the book is the fire that burned the Fenice opera house, the reactions of Venetians and those from outsiders like the Americans in Save Venice, the non-profit organization that raised funds for restoration of Venetian art and architecture, as well as the following investigations, legal battles and eventual restoration. The author functions as a sort of...more

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Jan 28, 2009

Jennifer rated it

The author of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil</> moves to Venice to get to know the city without tourists. He meets an odd assortment of characters, from the artisan who opened the first mask shop in Venice to the prosecutor investigating the fire that destroyed the city's great opera house.

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Aug 25, 2007

Leslie rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: Italy fans

Shelves: audiobooks, italy

I was so glad when this book was over. It was quite a chore to listen to on audio, but I think it would have been the same for print. The author moves to Venice and then infiltrates the locals' worlds. We learn a lot about the burning of the Fenice opera house, Ezra Pound's estate, and everyday life in Venice. I enjoyed learning that everyone walks in Venice--there are no cars. However, I felt that the author went into way more detail about the Fenice fire than I needed to know. It was just hard...more

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Jan 26, 2008

Hilda rated it

Recommended to Hilda by: Evie Lopez-Brignoni

Shelves: books-i-stopped-reading-before-i-fi

I didn't finish the book, but from what I read (about 3/4ths) I didn't like it, except for the Ezra Pound section - although I didn't really see the connection with the Fenice theater burning.

The book reminded me of a never-ending Dominick Dunne piece for "Vanity Fair" with its continuous name-dropping and irrelevant gossip - name dropping is only fun when you know who the people are! Alas, I'm not up on Venice society.

However, the writing itself - the use ...more

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Nov 29, 2008

Wendell rated it

*Midnight* was such an entertaining, intriguing book that it would only be natural to go looking for more from Berendt. Sadly, this book isn’t it.

Though Berendt tries to give *Falling Angels* a convincing through-line (and you’d think it would have one – the built-in whodunit of the burning of the Fenice Theatre), the thing simply never gels.

In part, it’s not Berendt’s fault; it’s the fault of “reality.” In typical Italian fashion, there’s no clear good guy or bad guy;...more*Midnight* was such an entertaining, intriguing book that it would only be natural to go looking for more from Berendt. Sadly, this book isn’t it.

Though Berendt tries to give *Falling Angels* a convincing through-line (and you’d think it would have one – the built-in whodunit of the burning of the Fenice Theatre), the thing simply never gels.

In part, it’s not Berendt’s fault; it’s the fault of “reality.” In typical Italian fashion, there’s no clear good guy or bad guy; the guy convicted for arson may or may not have done it (and it may or may not have been arson); the rebuilding dragged on for years while Berendt’s informants inconveniently died, and so on.

But in part it is precisely his fault, because he puts his focus in entirely the wrong place: on the spoiled, backbiting, nasty, venal, social climbing, ultrarich jerks (for the most part) who orbited the Fenice project in specific and who populate Italian “high society” in general.

Granted, there’s no snob like an Italian snob (unless it’s an English or American expat snob, and that’s a whole ‘nuther ball game), but Berendt seems to have had an especially difficult time finding one decent or likeable person in his cast of liars, petty criminals, reprobates, butt-kissers, tin gods, name droppers, arrivistes, and plutocrats. Really, barely one.

Nor does the book have anything particularly revealing to say about Venice, the Veneziani, or Italy (notwithstanding jacket copy to the contrary), because Berendt spent all his time in an echelon so esoteric, nihilistic, and cannibalistic that *Falling Angels* ends up being a book about the generic rich-and-bored (in any city, on any continent) and not about Venice or the Fenice.

As a result, it’s hard to know who could be interested in what amounts to 400 pages of society-page gossip about people you don’t know, aren’t ever going to know, and don’t especially *want* to know, but that’s what the book—deprived of a true mystery to explore—devolves into.

After all the time, effort, and money Berendt and his publisher sunk into Venice, I’m sure it would have been wrenching to walk away and say, “There’s no book here,” but that would very likely have been the honorable thing to do.(less)

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Nov 29, 2011

Maduck831 rated it

“Do you see a bridge as an obstacle – as just another set of steps to climb to get from one side of a canal to other? We Venetians do not see bridges as obstacles. To us bridges are transitions. We go over them very slowly. They are part of the rhythm. They are the links between two parts of a theater, like changes in scenery, or like the progression from Act One of a play to Act Two. Our role changes as we go over bridges. We cross from one reality…to another reality. From one street…to ...more“Do you see a bridge as an obstacle – as just another set of steps to climb to get from one side of a canal to other? We Venetians do not see bridges as obstacles. To us bridges are transitions. We go over them very slowly. They are part of the rhythm. They are the links between two parts of a theater, like changes in scenery, or like the progression from Act One of a play to Act Two. Our role changes as we go over bridges. We cross from one reality…to another reality. From one street…to another street. From one setting…to another setting.” (2) [Ludovico De Luigi] “The Death of Venice had been predicted, pronounced, and lamented for two hundred years, ever since 1797, when Napoleon brought the once-mighty Venetian Republic to its knees…”I will be an Attaila for the Venetian state!” Napoleon had thundered – in Italian so as not to be misunderstood.” (43) [Fenice Fire] [Lord Byron’s time in Venice] “Footsteps and voices were, in fact, the dominant sounds in Venice, since there were no cars to drown them out and very little vegetation to absorb them.” (49) [Gladio] [Felice Casson] [Parsifal – Richard Wagner] [Massimo Donadon] “I am, but if I had given my company an Italian name, people would think, ‘This product was made in Italy? I don’t trust it.’ Italy has an image of being nothing but Mafia, tailors and shoemakers. On the other hand, Germany is solid, scientific, and efficient. If anyone could be counted on to kill a rat, a German would be the one.” (119) [the Seguso dynasty] [Bridehead Revisited – movie] [Palazzo Barbaro] [Asolando – Browning] [Anders Zorn painting of Isabella Stewart Gardner] [The Aspen Papers – Henry James] [A Lume Spento – Ezra Pound] [Ezra Pound papers at Yale] [the Villa Foscari] [Peggy Guggenheim] [Save Venice] [film director Pier Paolo Pasolini] “But when I put my hand on the door, I caught sight of something that stopped me cold. The words “Vintage Clothing, Special Sale on Hats and Shawls” had been written on the window to the right of the door – with a blue felt-tip marker.” (361) [Senso – movie] (less)

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Nov 21, 2011

Christine rated it

Shelves: 2011-reads

Mr. Berendt happened to be visiting Venice in January of 1996 when a fire destroyed the Fenice Opera House. Being an author, it would make sense that he decided to write about it.

Including “Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil” among my favorite books I had some high expectations for this book. As an account of the fire and the resulting chaos - it was interesting, but as Mr. Berendt delves a little further back into the history and inhabitants of the city the book seems to lose...more

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Oct 25, 2011

Elizabeth Wallace rated it

· review of another edition

Shelves: non-fiction

Anybody who knows me knows I don't read a lot of non-fiction. I WANT to read non-fiction, but I get lured away by the latest Mieville or Valente, almost every time. It doesn't help that to me a lot of non-fiction feels tedious, like I'm pushing a gondola through the sludge of a half-drained Venetian canal (Heh. See what I did there?)

But THIS book, I liked. The title definitely grabbed me: in the early 1970's, before a lot of restoration got started in Venice, pieces of the marble ornam...moreAnybody who knows me knows I don't read a lot of non-fiction. I WANT to read non-fiction, but I get lured away by the latest Mieville or Valente, almost every time. It doesn't help that to me a lot of non-fiction feels tedious, like I'm pushing a gondola through the sludge of a half-drained Venetian canal (Heh. See what I did there?)

But THIS book, I liked. The title definitely grabbed me: in the early 1970's, before a lot of restoration got started in Venice, pieces of the marble ornaments on the Santa Maria della Salute Church were falling off onto pedestrians. A helpful citizen posted a sign outside: "BEWARE OF FALLING ANGELS." How can you NOT like a story like that?

And that's what the whole book is, a series of little stories. In some places one chapter has seven or eight interesting little tidbits, all woven together by the theme of the chapter, and all of the chapters are wound around the theme of Venice, specifically the Fenice opera house that all but burned down to the ground in 1996.

A few chapters in I'd told someone "It's a good book as long as you're okay that it doesn't have a point." I thought it was just a lot of randomly placed stories about Venice and Venice natives (who, according to Berendt, are both friendly and aloof, generous and gouging, trustworthy and just a smidge pirate. Bribery is a lot more common there than here...or rather they ADMIT to it more there than here. According to Berendt mind you, I haven't been myself, but after reading this book I sure plan to.) Where was I....OH yes, a point. At first I thought it didn't have one, but really, the theme is very subtle, and he weaves together all these people and events, and by the end it's tied up in a neat little literary bow. I was seriously impressed.

It's been years since I read "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil" but now I'm gonna have to go back and give it a look, because City of Falling Angels was the first book I've read in months that I was honestly sorry when it ended. I'd like to get back in the boat please! (Sorry, had to tie it all up...like a gondola to the pier...okay okay I'll stop....)

(less)

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Aug 02, 2011

Cyndie rated it

I enjoyed this book. Between the fire that destroyed the Fenice opera house to its re-opening after being completely rebuilt the author sandwiches stories of the disparate inhabitants of the unique Italian city of Venice. There was a preponderance of tales of ex-patriots, probably because the native Venetians are a very insular and embattled group. The author did manage to get some of them to reveal their stories and that helped to convey the reason that this book does not have the same intim...more

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Jan 16, 2011

Tom Croom rated it

My wife LOVES Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. When we met, I had neither read the book or watched the movie. Since she brought it up enough while we were dating, I decided to give John Berendt a shot.

Loved the book (MitGoGaE) and didn't like the movie (which was disappointing because I love Clint Eastwood and John Cusack.)

The love of that book led me to read this one.

Unfortunately.

The problem with writing novels based on actual events that you a...more

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Dec 27, 2010

Alexander Kwok rated it

This book, written by John Berendt, at first may seem a bit confusing. When I first started reading it, I came across the beginning pages, where Berendt writes that this book is a work of nonfiction, and therefore should be considered as one while the reader reads it. However, while going through the book, page by page, I felt that his non fiction historical narrative, seemed to resemble a more mystery/fiction novel that was hard to put down.

In these pages, Berendt starts out with th...more

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Aug 01, 2010

Erin rated it

Shelves: foreign, non-fiction, adult

While technically a piece of non-fiction, the narrative structure of this book makes it seem more an interwoven collection of short vignettes. True to life though, they often have somewhat incomplete endings, although the author has worked them together in a way to give the satisfaction of an overall complete story that tells the real story of the Venice under the glitter and glamour of the tourist culture. While the picture is still presented by an interloper into Venetian culture, his view s...more

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Jun 14, 2010

Melody rated it

Shelves: creative-nonficton-memoir

If John Berendt's most recent creative work lacks the wildly entertaining characters that made Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, it is nonetheless an enjoyable beach read, an engaging exploration of the quirks of Venetian culture and politics. Like Midnight, City of Falling Angels takes the resolution of a public mystery as its (very)loose premise: in this case, the suspected arson of the Fenice, Venice's venerable Opera House.

I found that City of Falling Angels suffers fr...more

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May 20, 2010

Madeline rated it

Shelves: history-nonfiction

In 1996, a fire broke out somewhere inside the empty Fenice opera house in Venice. The opera house was being restored, and was supposed to reopen within a month. When the fire broke out, a million things went swiftly and horribly wrong: the interior of the opera house was littered with open paint cans, chemicals, and cloths, making accidental fire an inevitability, and the fire alarm was disabled. The canal next to the Fenice had been drained recently, and because of this the fire boats weren't ...moreIn 1996, a fire broke out somewhere inside the empty Fenice opera house in Venice. The opera house was being restored, and was supposed to reopen within a month. When the fire broke out, a million things went swiftly and horribly wrong: the interior of the opera house was littered with open paint cans, chemicals, and cloths, making accidental fire an inevitability, and the fire alarm was disabled. The canal next to the Fenice had been drained recently, and because of this the fire boats weren't even able to reach the building at first, and then had no immediate water supply. They had to collect water from the Grand Canal and bring it over by helicopter - by then, the opera house was in flames and there was no way to stop it. The fire department had to focus on keeping the fire from spreading to the rest of the very flammable city, and as a result the inhabitants of Venice were forced to watch, weeping, as the centuries-old opera house burned to the ground in front of them.

That's the opening scene of The City of Falling Angels, and it's the best part of the book. Berendt describes people watching the destruction of the opera house as they try to keep their own homes from catching fire, and the most anyone can do is watch the fire and cry, while every now and then we get lines like, "A deafening crash resounded in the depths of the Fenice. The great crystal chandelier had fallen to the floor." (Fair warning: if you don't understand why people would weep at the destruction of an opera house, this is not your book)

Three days later, enter John Berendt, who sees the effects the Fenice fire has had on the residents of Venice, and decides that it might make a good subject for a book. He spends the next eight years living in Venice to interview people about the fire and everything else in their lives, because he's John Berendt and he can do that. He interviews judges, restoration experts, lawyers, and just about everyone who witnessed the fire (they include an Italian count and an elderly glassblower). People suspect that the Fenice fire was arson, possibly the result of the Mafia. The investigation is long and very interesting, and it's the start of a really good mystery.

Only the start of one, unfortunately. If this book had just been about the Fenice fire, the investigation, and the restoration process, it would have been really interesting and illuminating. But Berendt just can't stay focused. He meanders from one plot to the next, like he's trying to keep up with the "Look How Many Zany Eccentrics I Can Find" cred he established in Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil. Although here, "Zany Eccentrics" is replaced by "Obscenely Rich Expatriate Snobs." One man Berendt meets at a party excitedly explains to him how an aristocracy is the best form of government, because then all the good leadership qualities get passed down through one family. Another woman belongs to a family of expats who first moved to Venice in the 1800s when Boston got too goddamned Irish for their tastes (Berendt states this more diplomatically, but that's the gist).

He can't focus his story on the Fenice. He talks about the fire and the investigation for a while, then suddenly he's spending fifteen pages telling us about a glassblower's family drama. Then thirty-eight pages on the previously-mentioned expat family. Then forty-nine pages on Ezra Pound's aging mistress and her efforts to keep his papers and letters from being stolen by the so-called "Ezra Pound Foundation." Here we break for a short revisit to the Fenice fire, and then he spends forty-two pages telling us all about the drama between two guys in charge of the American non-profit group Save Venice. Then thirty pages on a poet who killed himself, or maybe not.

Yes, I counted all of those pages. No, none of those side stories have anything to do with the Fenice fire. No, none of them are even mildly interesting, except maybe the Pound one. Yes, every single conflict Berendt shows us is explored in nitpicking depth, and then dropped without a satisfying conclusion. Yes, it is irritating.

I think, ultimately, the problem with this book was that it was presented wrong. I went into it expecting an in-depth investigation of a real-life mystery: the Fenice fire. Instead, I got a wandering, often overly-detailed look at the inhabitants of Venice and their daily drama. Which is fine - if that's what I'd expected to get out of this book. Had Berendt written this book as a series of essays on Venice, as another reviewer recommended, that would have been good. If he had presented the book as a portrait of Venetians and been more clear about the fact that the Fenice fire was more of a subplot, that would have also been fine. As things are, however, I was not expecting most of what I was shown in this book, and it was disappointing.

That being said, I really really want to go to Venice now. (less)

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Feb 14, 2010

Ed Coker rated it

By way of background, for many years,I had three martini lunches monthly with a retired friend, who had attained great heights in the corporate world. He was the Number 2 guy at Winn Dixie when he retired at age 65. He rented an office next to mine and we started having lunch when he was in his late 60s and continued the practice until he died at 85 back in the 1990s. He enjoyed hearing and telling good stories. He had started as a clerk for the Winn Lovett grocery chain at the age of 13 and ...more

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Jan 21, 2010

Tony Taylor rated it

· review of another edition

Just as John Berendt's first book, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, was settling into its remarkable four-year run on The New York Times bestseller list, he discovered a new city whose local mysteries and traditions were more than a match for Savannah, whose hothouse eccentricities he had celebrated in the first book. The new city was Venice, and he spent much of the last decade wandering through its canals and palazzos, seeking to understand a place that any native will tell you is easy...moreJust as John Berendt's first book, Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, was settling into its remarkable four-year run on The New York Times bestseller list, he discovered a new city whose local mysteries and traditions were more than a match for Savannah, whose hothouse eccentricities he had celebrated in the first book. The new city was Venice, and he spent much of the last decade wandering through its canals and palazzos, seeking to understand a place that any native will tell you is easy to visit but hard to know.

Venice, a city steeped in a thousand years of history, art and architecture, teeters in precarious balance between endurance and decay. Its architectural treasures crumble—foundations shift, marble ornaments fall—even as efforts to preserve them are underway. The City of Falling Angels opens on the evening of January 29, 1996, when a dramatic fire destroys the historic Fenice opera house. The loss of the Fenice, where five of Verdi's operas premiered, is a catastrophe for Venetians. Arriving in Venice three days after the fire, Berendt becomes a kind of detective—inquiring into the nature of life in this remarkable museum-city—while gradually revealing the truth about the fire.

In the course of his investigations, Berendt introduces us to a rich cast of characters: a prominent Venetian poet whose shocking "suicide" prompts his skeptical friends to pursue a murder suspect on their own; the first family of American expatriates that loses possession of the family palace after four generations of ownership; an organization of high-society, partygoing Americans who raise money to preserve the art and architecture of Venice, while quarreling in public among themselves, questioning one another's motives and drawing startled Venetians into the fray; a contemporary Venetian surrealist painter and outrageous provocateur; the master glassblower of Venice; and numerous others-stool pigeons, scapegoats, hustlers, sleepwalkers, believers in Martians, the Plant Man, the Rat Man, and Henry James.(less)

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Dec 07, 2009

Charles Matthews rated it

This review originally ran in the San Jose Mercury News on October 2, 2005:

Venice may be the world's most sublimely irrelevant city, a place for historians, poets, architects, dreamers, rich idlers, trinket-sellers, pigeons and tourists. Fortunately, there are more than enough of those to keep the city afloat -- literally.
John Berendt's book about Venice, ''The City of Falling Angels,'' is inevitably going to be compared to his phenomenal bestseller, ''Midnight in the Garden ...moreThis review originally ran in the San Jose Mercury News on October 2, 2005:

Venice may be the world's most sublimely irrelevant city, a place for historians, poets, architects, dreamers, rich idlers, trinket-sellers, pigeons and tourists. Fortunately, there are more than enough of those to keep the city afloat -- literally.
John Berendt's book about Venice, ''The City of Falling Angels,'' is inevitably going to be compared to his phenomenal bestseller, ''Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil,'' which was set in Savannah, Ga., a city with a similarly spooky, anachronistic quality. If we can trust him, both cities are swarming with eccentrics, some of them very wealthy, some amusing and some dangerous. And in both books, Berendt's way of getting at the essence of the cities is to focus on a crime. In Savannah it was murder; in Venice it's arson: On Jan. 29, 1996, Teatro la Fenice, an opera house for which the cliché ''jewel box'' almost seems to have been coined, was destroyed by fire.

Berendt arrived in the city three days after the fire, and the events that followed -- the investigation into how it happened and how it was fought, the legal and bureaucratic complications, the trial of the arsonists and the efforts to restore the theater -- gave him the thread that ties the book together. But it's a loose tie. Anyone who has been to Venice knows how easy it is to get lost in the maze of alleys, bridges, plazas and canals -- to stray into something fascinating when you're on the way to something else -- and Berendt's narrative does that, too. There are long sections that have nothing to do with the Fenice, and an abundance of characters who turn up just because Berendt can't resist writing about them.
For example, there's Massimo Donadon, a.k.a. the Rat Man of Treviso, an exterminator who claims to control ''thirty percent of the international rat-poison market'' because he blends his toxins to appeal to the tastes that rats have developed by eating the local cuisines: ''So for Germany I make a rat poison that is forty-five percent pork fat. My French rat poison has butter in it. For America I use vanilla, granola, popcorn, and a little margarine, because Americans eat little butter.'' But Donadon tells Berendt that he has noticed that Italian rats have begun to prefer plastic to Parmesan because, ''like people, they are losing their taste for natural food. They are going for junk food.'' His solution: ''I've put granulated plastic in my rat poison!''
The book is full of such characters, many of whom give us reason to remember the warning one Venetian gives to Berendt: ''Venetians never tell the truth. We mean precisely the opposite of what we say.'' That version of the liar's paradox -- classically stated by Epimenides the Cretan, who proclaimed, ''All Cretans are liars,'' thereby both proving and disproving his own premise -- sets the tone for the book. Berendt's landlady explains that if Venetians ''discover you're someone who tells the truth all the time, they'll simply write you off as a bore.''
Not surprisingly, Venice has been a magnet for people whose profession it is to make things up: poets and novelists like Byron, the Brownings, Henry James, Thomas Mann, Ezra Pound. One of the tales Berendt tells us concerns the battle over the letters and manuscripts that were in the possession of Pound's mistress, Olga Rudge. It's a story that mirrors the one told in James' novel ''The Aspern Papers,'' which James based on a story he had heard about what Byron's mistress, Claire Clairmont, did with the poet's letters. In Venice, life imitates fiction imitating life.
It's a city for feuds as well as fibs. Berendt tells us about the Segusos, one of the city's eminent glassmaking families, which split apart when one of the brothers started a rival company, secretly registering his father's name as a trademark. And he visits the Curtis family, the American owners of the elegant Palazzo Barbaro, who squabbled over the future of a house that had been the setting for movies like ''The Wings of the Dove.''
But the feud that most engages Berendt's attention is the one that split Save Venice, a historic-preservation organization, just when it should have been focused on the restoration of the Fenice. It was run by two men with egos as large as their fortunes: the chairman of Save Venice, Lawrence Dow Lovett, and the president, Randolph ''Bob'' Guthrie.
A New York plastic surgeon, Guthrie charged that Lovett, the heir to the Piggly Wiggly supermarket fortune, was hogging the credit for Save Venice's restoration projects, which were funded by high-profile galas: ''At any given function, one spotted the likes of Hubert de Givenchy, Prince Amyn Aga Khan, Evangeline Bruce, Michael York, the American ambassador Maxwell Rabb, and Their Royal Highnesses Prince and Princess Michael of Kent.''
Lovett kept the glitterati happy, entertaining Princess Diana at his Venetian palazzo. Guthrie was the nuts-and-bolts workaholic, running Save Venice from his Manhattan townhouse. And Berendt's account of the skirmishes and snubs in their struggle to control Save Venice is amusing if you enjoy haute back-stabbing.
In the end, Lovett left Save Venice, trailing aristocrats as a comet trails ice, and started an organization called Venetian Heritage. On its letterhead, ''Twenty-one of the fifty names . . . had titles: one duke, one marchese, one marchesa, one baroness, the usual counts and countesses, and no fewer than six Highnesses, both Royal and Serene. Save Venice, in contrast, was down to its last titled board member, a baroness.''
Venetian Heritage made no contribution to the restoration of the Fenice, while Save Venice gave $300,000 for the opera house's ceiling. Yet at the gala reopening, ''Lovett had been given two choice seats in the orchestra, on the aisle,'' while the seat allotted to Bob Guthrie's wife, Bea, was up near ''the Save Venice-sponsored ceiling. . . . Larry Lovett was clearly still the favorite among Venetians with power.''
The usual note struck in books about Venice is melancholy, a lament for a city sinking slowly into the Adriatic. Berendt's book acknowledges the unsettling reality, but with its generously entertaining celebration of the city's quirks and oddballs, it also echoes some of the proud optimism of the Venetian who told him, ''When you see a five-hundred-year-old Venetian building, it may be a bit shabby and possibly even in danger. But you can't describe it as 'decaying.' It has endured five hundred years! The 'decaying Venice' is all a big myth. That's what I mean about Save Venice. Forget it. Venice will save itself.''
When you think of the fate of New Orleans, another pleasure-loving city whose truce with the sea was calamitously broken, that statement seems to pile the hubris high. But don't forget: ''Venetians never tell the truth.''
(less)

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Oct 04, 2009

Al Bità rated it

Those familiar with this author's excellent 'Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil' will know how well Berendt writes, and this is no exception. Set in Venice Berendt covers various issues relating to the fire which demolished the grand opera House of the Fenice in Venice. Along the way we are introduced to various 'important' figures in the story, which also includes Americans concerned with maintaining the cultural import of Venice with monetary backing and overseeing restoration work. Wh...more

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Jul 19, 2011

Lili rated it

· review of another edition

Recommends it for: Elizabeth, Katia, Cooper, Ken and anyone else who appreciates good travel literature

Shelves: audio-from-the-library

Add half a star, because I prefer this book about Venice to his earlier Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil about Savannah. Although the author uses the same "spoke and hub" structure in both books, in this one he allows the tales about the individual people to overshadow the central event of the story - the fire at the Fenice Opera House and its aftermath - and that ensures that the book is much more about Venice and its culture than any one specific individual. Generally, he wr...moreAdd half a star, because I prefer this book about Venice to his earlier Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil about Savannah. Although the author uses the same "spoke and hub" structure in both books, in this one he allows the tales about the individual people to overshadow the central event of the story - the fire at the Fenice Opera House and its aftermath - and that ensures that the book is much more about Venice and its culture than any one specific individual. Generally, he writes about a fire-related topic (or person or organization), uses that to launch into a tale about a person or a problem, develops all facets of that person or problem, and then eventually returns to a fire-related topic a few days/weeks/months/years later. Sometimes he returns to the same people/problems at a later time, and sometimes he ties them up at first visit. The transitions were so smooth that occasionally I had to rewind the CD to figure out how it had happened. If he wanted, the author could have removed the fire/aftermath "hub" all together, and transformed the book into a series of well-written character sketches that still would have created a deeply unique portrait of Venice.

Like the audio version of Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil, the audio version of this book also had an additional conversation with the author about his book. It was curious to hear that the success of "Midnight" prompted the author to think about another place that had a similarly strong "personality" that might lend itself to the writing of a second book in the same style. Two years after the publication of "Midnight" he moved to Venice, accidentally arriving a few days after the fire. It took him four years to decide that he actually had enough material to write "Falling Angels" and a few more years to complete it.

Overall, I believe another reader's opinion (especially if that reader is a friend of mine) will depend on how tolerant they are of the alternation between the fire-related stories and all the other stories of Venetians, and which of these odd other stories sticks in their memory. There seems to be a little bit of everything in these "spoke" stories, and I'm sure that I've forgotten more of the uninteresting parts in favor of remembering more of the lovely/interesting stories.

By the way, this is my favorite Venice book: even better than either of Marlena De Blasi's autobiographical writings about Venice (A Thousand Days in Venice: An Unexpected Romance and the first part of A Thousand Days in Tuscany: A Bittersweet Adventure). Of course, The Wings of the Dove by Henry James has been on my "to read" list ever since I saw the movie (which incidentally was filmed in one of the palaces that was discussed in "Falling Angels" because of its relationship to James as well as the then current drama of its sale).(less)

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May 11, 2011

Summer rated it

Recommends it for: Venice afficianados

Recommended to Summer by: Bookgroup

Shelves: bookclub, non-fiction

Very interesting. I want to visit Venice even more now. Book follows the events surrounding the burning of the opera house and the high society of Venice at the time. My favorite bits concerned the artist De Luigi. He says lots of thoughtful things.

Favorite quotes:
p1/3. (Count Girolamo Marcello) ‘Everyone in Venice is acting,’ Count Girolamo Marcello told me. ‘Everyone plays a role, and the role changes. The key to understanding Venetians is rhythm—the rhythm of the lagoon, the r...moreVery interesting. I want to visit Venice even more now. Book follows the events surrounding the burning of the opera house and the high society of Venice at the time. My favorite bits concerned the artist De Luigi. He says lots of thoughtful things.

Favorite quotes:
p1/3. (Count Girolamo Marcello) ‘Everyone in Venice is acting,’ Count Girolamo Marcello told me. ‘Everyone plays a role, and the role changes. The key to understanding Venetians is rhythm—the rhythm of the lagoon, the rhythm of the ater, the tides, the waves....’...’The rhythm in Venice is like breathing,’ he said. ‘High water, high pressure: tense. Low water, low pressure: relaxed. Venetians are not at all attuned to the rhythm of the wheel. That is for other places, places with motor vehicles. Ours is the rhythm of the Adriatic. The rhythm of the sea. In Venice the rhythm flows along with the tide, and the tide changes every six hours.’ ... ‘Do you see a bridge as an obstacle—as just another set of steps to climb to get from one side of a canal to the other? We venetians do not see bridges as obstacles. To us bridges are transitions. We go over them very slowly. They are part of the rhythm. They are the links between two parts of a theater, like changes in scenery, or like the progression form Act One of a play to Act Two. Our role changes as we go over bridges. We cross from one reality...to another reality. From one street...to another street. From one setting...to another setting.’ ... ‘A trompe l’oeil painting,’ Count Marcello went on, ‘is a painting that is so lifelike it doesn’t look like a painting at all. It looks like real life, but of course it is not. It is reality once removed. What, then, is a trompe l’oeil painting when it is reflected in a mirror? Reality twice removed? Sunlight on a canal is reflected up through a window onto the ceiling, then form the ceiling onto a vase, and form the vase onto a glass, or a silver bowl. Which is the real sunlight? Which is the real reflection? What is true? What is not true? The answer is not so simple, because the truth can change. I can change. You can change. That is the Venice effect.’ ... ‘Venitians never tell the truth. We mean precisely the opposite of what we say.’
p.34: (Author) To me Venice was not merely beautiful; it was beautiful everywhere. On one occasion I set about testing this otion by concocting a game called ‘photo roulette,’ the object of which was to walk around the city taking photographs at unplanned moments—whenever a church bell rang or at every sighting of a dog or cat—to see how often, standing at an arbitrary spot, one would be confronted by a view of exceptional beauty. The answer: almost always.
p.51: (Rose Lauritzen) ‘In Venice, no matter what you say, everyone will assume you’re lying. Venetians always embellish, and they take it for granted you will, too. So you might as well. Because, funnily enough, if they discover you’re someone who tells the truth all the time, they’ll simply write you off as a bore.’
p.109: (Peter Lauritzen) ‘This palazzo was vacant for over a century...until 1974 when it was lovingly restored. The remarkable thing is that the detailing is not only original but intact—the frescoes, the mantelpieces, the stucco ornamentation. It took three months just to clean the floor, and what has emerged from the grime is a brilliant example of eighteenth-century terrazzo in perfect condition. As I always say: Nothing preserves like neglect!’
p.283: (Ludovico De Luigi) ‘Being arrested is good for the soul. I was arrested for committing ‘obscene acts in public.’ It happened when I invited the porn star Cicciolina to inaugurate my horse sculpture in St. Mark’s Square, and she arrived topless. In a court of law I was declared an immoral person—a disreputable person!’ De Luigi chuckled at the thought of it. ‘But for an artist, a reputation and a disreputation are the same. An artist wants to be recognized, to attract attention.’
p.331 (Mario Stefani) Loneliness is not being alone; it’s loving others to no avail.
p.339 (Ludovico De Luigi) ‘Me, I live in terror of the day they understand me, because it will mean I’m just like them. And that will be the end of my life, because all my life I’ve wanted not to be understood.’
p.377/8 ‘The father’s dead, the trial goes cold, and the mystery lingers on,’ said Ludovico De Luigi with a chuckle. ‘It’s all about money, as usual. Not love—money. The perfect ending, for Venice.’ ...
‘Why a perfect ending?’ I asked. ‘Things are left hanging.’
‘Yes, but this is the sort of ending Venice can live with, happily and forever.’ He daubed gold paint on the canvas. ‘Look what the story offers: a great fire, a cultural calamity, the spectacle of public officials blaming each other, and unseemly rush for the money to rebuild the theater, the satisfaction of a trial with guilty verdicts and jail sentences, the pride of the Fenice’s rebirth, and’—he lifted his brush and looked up—‘an unsolved mystery. Money secretly changing hands. Unnamed culprits hiding in the shadows. it stimulates the imagination, gives people the freedom to make up any scenario they want. What more could anyone ask?’(less)

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May 05, 2011

Ben rated it

It's always strange when I read something and can't decide if it's fiction or non-fiction. Twice, I had to jump back to the dust jacket to confirm that Berendt's take on Venice was truth, in as much as it could be. The interwoven tales of intrigue reveal sympathetic characters, lies and mysteries, and dozens of strange asides and questionable happenstances that deliver an intimate look at a mysterious city defined more by its people (and those who believe they're its people) than by the history ...more

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The son of two writers, John Berendt grew up in Syracuse, New York. He earned a B.A. in English from Harvard University, where he worked on the staff of The Harvard Lampoon. After graduating in 1961, he moved to New York City to pursue a career in publishing. He was editor of New York magazine from 1977 to 1979, and wrote a monthly column for Esquire from 1982 to 1994.

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