Diversions in Sicily

by Henry Festing Jones

This book is part of the TREDITION CLASSICS series. The creators of this series are united by passion for literature and driven by the intention of making all public domain books available in printed format again - worldwide. At tredition we believe that a great book never goes out of style. Several mostly non-profit literature projects provide content to tredition. To support their good work, tredition donates a portion of the proceeds from each sold copy. As a reader of a TREDITION CLASSICS book, you support our mission to save many of the amazing works of world literature from oblivion.

172 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1920

About the author

Henry Festing Jones was an English solicitor and writer, known as the friend and posthumous biographer of Samuel Butler.

Reviews

[X]

So boring! He spends half the book rambling about puppets.

[Timothy Ferguson]

An odd book, interesting but lopsided in its structure, about a Victorian-era tourist's time in Sicily, and his friendship with a particular Sicilian waiter. The book is eventually revealed to be written for his godson, to explain how the waiter met his wife, but on that level it makes little sense. Why tell a Sicilian boy how Sicilian marionettes work, and spend chapter after chapter on their stories, when he will experience them himself?

As a work for English readers, it doesn't have quite enough of the other to make it interesting as a travel diary. The main fellow, aside from some racism, is an unassuming sort, and he is surrounded by generous and happy people. There is no real goal or disappointment in it, and so no real conflict. Perhaps, like some of Twain's books, it is ruined by television: none of the marvels are still marvellous, because we have seen them. Maybe it's that Italians are not some mysterious people, who live months away by road, doing odd things and eating odd things and worshipping odd things, as they were for Jones, but are people we know and work with, and whose customs are unremarkable. At the time the book must have been popular, because a sequel was written.

The reader of the Librivox version is brilliant, though, and shows that a good reader can draw you in to even quite sparse material.


This review originally appeared on book coasters.

[Anne]

An enjoyable travel journal written at the turn of the twentieth century, at about the time that my grandparents emigrated from Sicily. It was fun to read about the customs and traditions of the Sicily that they called home, and many of those ancient festivals are still celebrated today in that beautiful country.