Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
Margherita Hack was a scientist and communicator, but she also expressed her opinions about attualità (current events). Part of this segment features a panel discussion she held with author Andrea Camilleri, best known for his novels about Inspector Montalbano that became a popular TV series.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
Margherita Hack spent some time in politics and was also an entrepreneur at times. But she had a lot of fun, too. On the panel with Camilleri, the author of the Montalbano stories, they all come out (in unison) with the famous introduction Montalbano sono (Montalbano, I am). Putting the verb at the end is typical of Sicily, where the story takes place. Otherwise, it would be Sono Montalbano (I'm Montalbano) or, on the phone, "This is Montalbano."
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
We discover that Margherita Hack was a devoted fan of the long-running TV series, Un posto al sole [a place in the sun]. She explains why. Francesca goes back to Trieste and meets up with Eda who talks about having lived in the same house with Margherita Hack.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
In this segment, Margherita talks about her choice not to have children and also discusses her position regarding God. She can't prove he exists nor can she prove he doesn't.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
Even though Aldo and Margherita were very different in many ways, they came together in their skepticism. Towards the end of her life, Margherita couldn't move around much, but her brain never stopped going.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
Margherita left a legacy of progress, both scientific and social. Perhaps she is still looking down on us, since an asteroid was named after her: 8558 Hack.
Difficulty: Adv-Intermediate
Italy
The alternative tourism video starts by showing some of Rome's iconic sites, but will focus on less well-known quarters, such as the Salario-Trieste neighborhood in north Rome.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
Rome's Coppedè Quarter is the focus of the segment. Its eclectic style is difficult to characterize, but the narrator talks of the liberty style, which stems from the Liberty department store in London. In English, we know this style by the French term, Art Nouveau.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
The segment shows us some interiors in Coppedè's dream-inspired complex.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
More dreamy interiors of the Coppedè complex and an introduction to the Keats–Shelley House in Piazza di Spagna.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
The segment touches on Byron and Shelley, but is mostly about Keats and his time in Rome. It also includes part of a beautiful love letter to Fanny Brawne. The narrator speaks of Keats living on the second floor. The Italian way of counting stories is to call the first floor, the ground floor, and the numbering starts above.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
The narrator reads some moving passages from the letters of John Keats and Fanny Brawne. Giacomo Leopardi, the Italian poet and near contemporary to Keats and Shelley, also lived in Piazza di Spagna.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
We visit the cemetery where the English poets are buried, and learn about the relationship between the Tiber River and the city of Rome.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
Rome's many bridges are the focus of this video, including the Ponte Rotto, which dates back to ancient Rome. Only part of the Ponte Rotto is still standing and this is why it is called rotto or broken. Rivers are masculine in Italian, and ancient Roman statues portray River Gods as recumbent elderly men with long beards.
Difficulty: Intermediate
Italy
The tour draws to a close in Rome's rougher neighborhoods, those that were particularly fascinating to poet and filmmaker Pier Paolo Pasolini.
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