Last week, a reporter asked President Trump about Russia’s perpetual murder of civilians in Ukraine. Trump began his answer by saying, “Look, we’re not involved. We’re separated by an ocean.” He went on to talk about hatred on both sides.

Do you think the Ukrainians have any reason for such hatred?

When listening to President Trump, I thought of two quotations. One, you are very familiar with. It was uttered by Neville Chamberlain—a basically good if misguided man—in September 1938: “… a quarrel in a faraway country between people of whom we know nothing.”

I also thought of Ronald Reagan, and his address in July 1987 at the Ukrainian National Catholic Shrine in Washington, D.C. Reagan said:

Our global commitment to freedom does not mandate the sending of arms or troops, but at the very least it means that any people whose liberty is denied or whose independence is violated—that these people know we Americans are on their side.

Yes. These people ought to know, and deserve to know, we are on their side.

By the way, anyone who thinks that a distant conflict can have no bearing on the United States is too ignorant to be anywhere near foreign policy. A conflict can wind up nearer than you think.

Men such as George C. Marshall, and the once-isolationist Arthur Vandenberg, tried to impress this on Americans after World War II.

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Hussam Luka was one of the nastiest men in the regime of Bashar Assad—and that was one of the nastiest regimes on the planet. The BBC did a lengthy, dogged investigation of him. Guess where this killer, kidnapper, and torturer found refuge? Russia. (Like Assad himself, of course.)

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I wrote an article about the late senator Lindsey Graham. A “man of our times,” I called him. The article touches on what it means to be a politician—or different ways of being a politician—and I’d like to quote a little:

Congressman Henry Hyde, the Illinois Republican who served in the House from 1975 to 2007, had the job of speaking to new members at their freshman orientation. He stressed one thing: Figure out what you’re willing to lose your seat over. What principle or policy. If there is no such thing, “then you’re going to do damage here.”

I thought you might like a fuller version of Hyde’s remarks. A congressional staffer sent this to me some years ago. Here is what Hyde said on November 29, 1990:

This may sound odd, even ironic. You are here in the flush of victory. And yet it is precisely now that I ask you to contemplate the possibility of defeat—perhaps even the necessity of defeat.

Edmund Burke, in 1774, set forth a model we should all emulate when he told his Bristol constituents: “Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgement, and he betrays instead of serving you if he sacrifices it to your opinion.”

Let me put the matter plainly: If you are here simply as a tote board registering the current state of opinion in your district, you are not going to serve either your constituents or the Congress of the United States weIl.

Your constituents expect you to represent their interests, and that you should certainly do. But you are also a member of the Congress, and your responsibilities are far greater than those of an ombudsman for your district. You must take, at times, a national view, even if, in taking that view, you risk the displeasure of your neighbors and friends back home.

Indeed, I feel obliged to put the matter more sharply still: If you don’t know the principle, or the policy, for which you are willing to lose your office, then you are going to do damage here.

This institution needs more members willing to look beyond the biennial contest for power, more committed to public service as a vocation rather than merely a career.

Well said, right?

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Let me quote from my article about Lindsey Graham a bit more. I said that, when we assess the senator’s behavior, meaning the mental and political gymnastics he performed to defend and support Donald Trump,

we must also consider the simple matter of partisanship—“the call of the tribe.” (Mario Vargas Llosa used this phrase in the title of a book.) Graham was a Republican, and where his tribe went, there went he.

But he was probably more aware of this than most. He would comment on his own hypocrisy.

Yes.

When Trump and his team covered for the Saudi dictatorship after that dictatorship murdered the journalist Jamal Khashoggi in 2018, Graham said, “If they were in a Democratic administration, I would be all over them for being in the pocket of Saudi Arabia.”

When Trump announced a pullout from Syria later in 2018, Graham said, “If Obama had done this, we’d be going nuts right now: how weak, how dangerous.”

Okay. A friend of mine—a student of philosophy—e-mailed,

It’s a fascinating thing, isn’t it? How Graham managed to be upfront about being a hypocrite. Are those who admit their hypocrisy better or worse than the non-confessional hypocrites? Not a rhetorical question.

I answered,

Somehow, it makes me feel better when a hypocrite acknowledges his hypocrisy, but I don’t know what the philosophical answer is!

My friend answered,

I’m with you; can’t help but prefer the “honest” knave. Yet the trouble with the forthcoming hypocrite is that he may be furthest from redemption, as he seems to confess that the charge of hypocrisy has lost all bite on his conscience.

Smart dude, my friend.

***

Just a little more quoting from my Graham piece, if you don’t mind, and I do it for a purpose:

“You want Graham to have a seat at the table,” I often heard. “You want Graham to play golf with Trump. Better that Graham be in his ear than the isolationists, right?”

Maybe. But Trump has always changed people more than they have changed him.

A reader tells me,

There’s a saying I learned from a youth pastor about 30 years ago: “It’s easier to pull someone out of a canoe than to pull someone into one.”

True dat.

***

My dear friends, I have been in Salzburg for a while, doing some annual work at the festival. For a review, published at The New Criterion, go here. It’s of a concert by the Vienna Philharmonic, conducted by Tugan Sokhiev, with the piano soloist Lang Lang.

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I will head this column of mine “Taking Sides, &c.” I borrow the phrase from a play, later a movie, about Wilhelm Furtwängler, the great German maestro, and the U.S. Army’s investigation of his conduct during the war.

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Before I left New York for Salzburg, I saw a sweet ’vette, parked all by its lonesome. What a fantastic machine, right? Possibly even better than the Vienna Philharmonic.

Oh, one more thing: In this podcast, we talk about Mikhail Pletnev’s transcription of the Grand pas de deux from Tchaikovsky’s Nutcracker. It is a frequent Malofeev encore. To hear Sasha in it, go here.

And one more one more thing: interviewee and interviewer:

He is, too, reliably.

Kevin is the national correspondent for The Dispatch, and his latest book—penetrating and stylish, in his accustomed fashion—is Big White Ghetto.

In our Q&A, we traverse many issues, of many types: political, literary, economic … One of our first issues is Homer’s Odyssey, and the new Christopher Nolan movie. Everyone with a pen has written about it. A piece by Kevin is one of the best: here.

What have the Greeks and Romans and antiquity in general meant in Kevin’s life? That’s what I want to know.

We then talk about—be prepared for three explosive words—“the common good.” Sounds good. Is it, and if so, how and when?

We move on to policing, and ICE in particular. (Are these guys police—actual cops—or do they belong in a different category?) Then we get into conservatism, and the state of the American Right.

Here is a general statement made by Kevin, one I fully endorse: “Our crisis in our politics is I think fundamentally a spiritual and moral crisis. It’s not an economic crisis.”

And yet, there is economics to discuss. Recently, I had a column headed “A Screaming Yet Quiet Problem, &c.” I was talking about our nation’s fiscal house: the federal budget deficit, the national debt. I ask Kevin to scream about it, as he has been doing for many years.

In truth, he does not scream. He addresses the problem in a cool and collected manner, while sparing nothing.

Another issue: the Haitians in a little Midwestern town. Two years ago, Kevin published a piece called “The Exotic Cat-Eaters of Springfield, Ohio.” (Marvelous, memorable piece of reporting and thinking.) In our Q&A, I quote to him a tweet from Noah Smith:

I will never forget the “Haitians eating cats” lie. I will never let it go. It was so deliberate and monstrous and unprovoked and cruel, and no one has ever apologized for it.

Something to think about. Something to burn about.

Toward the end of our conversation, we talk about language, accents, where we’re from. Kevin has lived all over America, and abroad (India). Is he always a Texan, wherever he goes?

Before signing off, I say, “Kevin, you provide your readers edification, laughs, and I would say comfort. You make one feel less alone, and thank you so much.” He answers, “Man, if people are turning to me for comfort, God help us.”

Well, so be it.

What my Detroit Tigers did last week reminded me of Rod Blagojevich—“Blago”—who was a corrupt governor of Illinois. (“Corrupt governor of Illinois” is a large category.)

We traded our best pitcher to the Dodgers and, for some reason, got relatively little in return. You can read about this fantastically lopsided trade here.

How good is Tarik Skubal? Well, in our uniform, he won the Cy Young Award the last two seasons—’24 and ’25.

Back in 2008, Illinois senator Barack Obama won the presidency, and that meant that the governor—Blago—had an opportunity to appoint a replacement senator. How would he sell that seat? That was his question.

The way he put it was, “I’ve got this thing, and it’s f***ing golden. I’m just not giving it up for f***ing nothing.”

Would that my Tigers had held something like that view.

(President Trump commuted Blagojevich’s sentence in 2020. Upon being released, Blago said of Trump, “He’s obviously got a big fan in me.” And “if you’re asking what my party affiliation is, I’m a Trumpocrat.” Blago had been a Democrat. He attended the 2024 Republican convention. As I see it, “Trumpocrat” is an inspired coinage, applying to millions.)

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Jonathan Netanyahu is one of the great men in Israeli history. He was a commando in the Raid on Entebbe, the operation to rescue hostages at the Ugandan airport in 1976—on July 4 of that year (America’s bicentennial day). Jonathan was the only Israeli killed in the operation.

The only Israeli soldier, I should say. Three hostages were killed in crossfire.

As you can read in this news article, the Ugandan dictatorship has now erected a monument to Jonathan. This is a nasty regime, obviously, whose “president” has been in “office” since … 1986. Still, I’m glad for the monument.

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Have you read about the Democratic candidate for governor in Wisconsin who wanted to cancel Thanksgiving? Cancel it for all, forever, I mean? You can read about this lady, and her hostility to Thanksgiving, here.

She regards Thanksgiving as a colonial offense.

What I say, briefly, is this: If you don’t like Thanksgiving, you don’t have to celebrate it. It’s a free country (thank God).

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I do like this candidate’s name—“Francesca Hong.” A combination of the Italian and the Chinese. Rather American, in truth.

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With the Republican Party Trumpified, our country desperately needs Democrats not to be nuts. They have a hard time delivering.

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A headline: “For sale: early access to Trump’s Truth Social posts.” A paragraph from the article:

“It’s insane,” said one Wall Street executive, who requested anonymity for fear of retaliation from the Trump administration. “I can say for myself and 200 of my friends in finance, we’re not getting anywhere near this. In another administration, this would be considered criminal.”

I grew up with an expression—something almost Biblical: “a nation of laws, not men.” Turned out to be kinda wrong, didn’t it?

Possibly, we will get back to the rule of law once Trump and Trumpism pass. I wonder: why not start now?

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Back when I was a Republican, we used to joke, “The press rediscovers the problem of homelessness every time a Republican is elected president.” Maybe Republicans will rediscover the rule of law, the importance of character, etc., once a Democrat is elected?

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I had the pleasure of being on the Reagan Caucus Podcast, hosted by John Daly and Cliff Smith (who was filling in for Thomas D. Howes). See the episode here.

“See” is a funny word in that context, isn’t it? Used to be, podcasts were heard, like radio programs. Increasingly, they are seen, on video.

John, Cliff, and I talked about a slew of issues, including character in office, an issue that gives many people the heebie-jeebies.

Cliff asked a good question: What constitutes character?

When it comes to American politics—when it comes to the presidency specifically—I don’t think my bar is too high.

Respect the Constitution.

Respect the rule of law.

Observe our traditions, our norms. You attend your successor’s inauguration. You don’t hang your banner on the Justice Department. You don’t put your name on another man’s memorial.

You don’t use your office to enrich yourself and your family. (I’m speaking of money here, not some other form of enrichment.)

When you lose an election, you concede it. You don’t sic a mob on the U.S. Congress for the purpose of stopping a constitutional process.

You don’t slobber over mass-murderous, anti-American dictators such as Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping, and Kim Jong-un.

I could go on. You have a basic integrity, trustworthiness, and patriotism. You don’t lie 24/7. You take a few hours off, maybe when you sleep.

I am not asking for some Periclean ideal. Just … you know: the minimum. Nixon and Clinton look almost quaint now.

If you say that Trump lacks the character to be president, you will hear from his supporters and defenders: “You’re a square, you’re a prig, you’re a scold. You have TDS,” i.e., “Trump Derangement Syndrome.”

Don’t buy it. Don’t let others make you ashamed for having standards that until recently were normal and uncontroversial.

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Does this image, circulated by our president, gross you out? I don’t see why it shouldn’t. You don’t have “TDS.” You simply have a stomach.

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Turn, now, to opera. All of our lives, we have heard musicologists say, “If Wagner had lived in the time of movies, he would not have composed operas. He would have made movies—operatic movies.”

Did you see this story? “AI-assisted staging draws boos at the Richard Wagner festival in Germany.” That would be the Bayreuth Festival. I can’t tell you anything about this production of Götterdämmerung—but I feel sure that if Wagner had had access to AI, he would have used it, ingeniously.

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Ethics, ethics. “Gene-edited beagles may offer a future option for people with dog allergies.” That is the headline over this article. I want people to be able to own dogs—to know the joy of owning dogs. What’s more, dogs need good owners. Good and loving owners.

But gene-editing and all that: it gives me the heebie-jeebies. Maybe I’m square, or conservative, and these innovations are mainly benign and salutary.

To be continued …

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Almost every morning, I wake up to news that Ukraine has struck military sites in Russia—and that Russia has struck civilians in Ukraine. Here is an item from yesterday. It comes from the Russian news organization in exile, Meduza.

Try not to get numb, if at all possible. Putin’s Russia is a terror-state. The routineness of its terror should not numb us to it.

Rarely is a war so asymmetrical as the Ukraine war. Rarely is a war so black-and-white. I think of what David Petraeus said, in 2023: This war is “about as clear a right-versus-wrong as we’ve seen in our lifetime.”

Thank you for reading, my friends, and subscribing, if you can and want. Talk to you soon. (My next offering will be a podcast with Kevin Williamson, that talent and gem.)

Sterling is an elections official in Georgia, a Republican. He refused to say that the 2020 presidential election in his state was anything other than what it was: scrupulously fair.

Stephen Richer was such an official in Arizona. I podcasted with him in April 2024, and I have now podcasted with Sterling. (A sterling guy, he is.)

We talk about many subjects—with an emphasis on the 2020 election—but I will be brief in this accompanying text.

Many people say of Mike Pence, “Yeah, he did not betray his oath on January 6. He did not betray his country. Big deal. You wanna give him a cookie for that? You wanna praise and hail him?”

You can say something similar about Gabriel Sterling, Stephen Richer, and others. I understand the sentiment very well.

There is a story I’ve told many times, in different contexts. It is about Bobby Jones in the 1925 U.S. Open. He called a penalty on himself—a two-stroke penalty. No one had seen the infraction. But he had, and golf is a game of honor.

He wound up losing the Open by one stroke.

When people praised him for his sportsmanship and honesty, he would have none of it. He scoffed, “Sooner praise a man for not robbing a bank.”

I get it, I get it—and I agree with it. But …

What if everyone else is robbing a bank? What if powerful people, and your fellow party members, are pressuring you to rob a bank? What if it takes courage, guts, not to rob a bank?

This is why I think the likes of Pence deserve our thanks.

In our podcast, Gabriel Sterling tells a story or two, and I will quote him in one (paraphrasing slightly):

Not long after the election, I was at a Publix, a supermarket, here in Metro Atlanta, and there was a young African-American man, wearing a mask. He was mopping. He was down on the floor, cleaning up a spill, and he saw me, and he got up immediately. He said, “Mr. Sterling, Mr. Sterling.” I’m like, “Yes?” He said, “I just want to thank you so much. This was my first vote. I’m so proud to know that you were defending it.”

I’m getting teary-eyed now thinking about it.

Same here, honestly.

Some issues that are screamingly important are also … boring. Making it hard to get people to pay attention to them.

Let me give you a line published by the Associated Press yesterday: The U.S. government “has spent $827 billion so far this fiscal year to service the national debt, more than it has devoted to national defense.”

That is meaningful. And bad, very bad.

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I’ve written an article about how elections are rigged—staged, faked—in dictatorships. I linked to a column published by Charles Krauthammer in 1987. “The higher the score rolled up by the ruling party in elections, the more tyrannous the regime,” he said.

Today, I’d like to talk about the column more broadly. It was mainly about pardons, not elections. In the Washington Post, the column was headed “The Pardon Is for Tyrants.”

Listen to Dr. K.: “The more lawless, capricious, and imperious a regime, the greater its propensity to make use of the pardon power.”

Listen to him some more:

In democracies, the pardon should be used as sparingly as possible. … Only on these rarest of occasions should it supplant the workings of ordinary justice. Free countries have another mechanism for dealing with that. It is called law.

The pardon is for tyrants.

Strong stuff, with recta ratio (right reason) beneath it. (Bill Buckley once published a collection under the title “Right Reason.”)

Maybe two more sentences, from Dr. K.:

The promiscuous dispensation of clemency is not a sign of political liberality. It is instead one of those valuable, identifying marks of tyranny.

George W. Bush would pardon people for doing things like turning back the odometer on their car, in their youth. The Trump presidency has made me think … well, along Charles Krauthammer’s lines.

I expect to have more to say about this matter in due course.

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In my article about elections—elections in dictatorships such as Russia—I mentioned Boris Nemtsov, the Russian opposition leader, murdered in 2015 (about 200 yards from the Kremlin wall).

The day my article came out, I noticed this, from Reuters: “Moscow court orders arrest of slain Putin critic Boris Nemtsov’s daughter.” Zhanna Nemtsova is in exile, presiding over the Boris Nemtsov Foundation for Freedom.

Obviously, Zhanna and her organization are an offense unto Putin.

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A few nights ago, I attended a concert that I will discuss in an upcoming issue of The New Criterion. Onstage was a youth orchestra, conducted by Mei-Ann Chen, an American born in Taiwan. She is a capable musician, with the intangible ingredients of warmth and vitality.

I would like to make a point about something in her bio. Chen is “chief conductor,” says the bio, “of Austria’s Recreation–Grosses Orchester Graz at Styriarte (the first Asian woman to hold this position).”

My point: We’re cutting our ethnic, racial, and sexual milestones awfully fine these days, aren’t we?

Do you know what I mean? Come on. Will there be a first Asian woman who is lefthanded to lead that ensemble in Graz (assuming Maestra Chen herself is not lefthanded)?

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I have done several podcasts with Thomas Sowell, the economist, philosopher, and writer. In one of them, I asked him to discuss some of his least favorite phrases. One was “trickle-down theory.” Another was “the legacy of slavery.” He said something like, “You’re really testing my blood pressure today.”

I thought of him when looking at a clip of James Talarico, the Democratic senatorial nominee in Texas. Talarico said, “Trickle-down economics is not a theory, it is theft.”

He is certainly right in the first part of that sentence—more right than he knows.

You may be interested in looking at a 2012 paper by Sowell: “ ‘Trickle Down’ Theory and ‘Tax Cuts for the Rich.’ ” About “trickle down,” he writes, “No such theory has been found in even the most voluminous and learned histories of economic theories.” He goes on to say that “trickle down” is “a classic example of arguing against a caricature instead of confronting the argument actually made.”

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***

Regular readers may know that I think a lot of Mario Vargas Llosa, both as a novelist and as a political writer. For a piece of mine about MVL, go here.

There is a new biography of him, and it was reviewed in the Guardian. The review says that Vargas Llosa went “from the hard left to the hard right.”

If you describe Mario Vargas Llosa, of all people, as “hard right,” what language have you left over for the hard right, or even the soft? MVL was a classical liberal if there ever was one.

Toward the end of his life, he wrote a book about all this: The Call of the Tribe. It is an intellectual autobiography, in which he pays tribute to the men who shaped him: Adam Smith, José Ortega y Gasset, Friedrich Hayek, Karl Popper, Raymond Aron, Isaiah Berlin, and Jean-François Revel.

He also hails, and thanks, such men as George Orwell, Arthur Koestler, and Albert Camus.

I expect more from the Guardian and its editors. They may be on the left, but they are serious, and not stupid.

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Speaking of novels, or novelists: Henry Oliver, of The Common Reader, had an interesting article on the question, “Do you have to like the character, or characters, in order to like the novel, or story?”

I immediately thought of a biography—a great biography, one that belongs in some biographical hall of fame. I’m talking about Toscanini: Musician of Conscience, by Harvey Sachs (a friend of mine).

I wrote about this bio, this opus, in two parts: here and here. One can learn a lot about music—a lot—from Arturo Toscanini. I must say, however, that as I turned the pages—and turn them I did—I did not especially like the man.

A question: Could I write a biography of a man I did not especially care for? Sure, I guess—same as I could write a piece. But I would rather write a biography of someone I admire, at least on balance.

(I would like to write about George W. Bush.)

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So, I was watching the Tiger game with my mom. I’m talking about the Detroit Tigers, our baseball team. We have a player named Outman—kind of a funny name for a baseball player, at least on offense? We also have a player named Waguespack—Jacob Waguespack.

I could not place the name. I could not discern its origins. A little Googling told me this: “Waguespack” was originally “Wagensbach,” in the Rhineland. “Wagensbach” means “Wagon Stream” or “Wagon Brook.” Somehow, in Louisiana, “Wagensbach” got changed into “Waguespack.”

(You know what Brahms said about Bach, don’t you? About Johann Sebastian Bach? “He was not a brook, he was an ocean!”)

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Here’s a bumper sticker I can get behind, and I’m not talking about the “G,” symbolizing the Green Bay Packers, under the Chevy logo:

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I’m not exactly sure what kelly green is. But I think this is a kelly-green Aston Martin. Sharp, in any case. Darn sharp.

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Check out this wiener, in Times Square yesterday!

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See the small print on this sign here? “Not famous but known.” Hmmm. Kind of like … well, me?

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At the movie house next to me, the first showing of The Odyssey is at 7:45. In the morning. I’ve lived in America for a long time. I had never heard of a movie starting at 7:45 a.m. Is this a good sign for culture? I’m going to count it as one.

I thank you for reading and subscribing, my friends. Really.

The other day, I was writing about the Canadian wildfires and their effects on the United States—in my home state of Michigan, for example, and in New York City, where I’ve lived since the ’90s.

People have broken out their face masks for the first time since the pandemic!

Anyway, someone responded to me by saying, “Mother Nature, doing her thing.”

That kind of arrested me. We are so used to blaming someone—and I don’t mean Mother Nature. Usually, the blamees are our political enemies.

There is a song in American culture: “Blame Canada.” It’s a parody song. The reason it’s funny is that Canada is such a benign and blessed neighbor of ours.

Blaming Canada for the ills of the world is … well, parodic. Isn’t it?

The Trump administration has been doing its best to make a villain out of Canada. Here is a video of Peter Navarro, the president’s trade adviser, laying into Canada once more. The country’s negotiators, he says, are “some of the most dishonest people I’ve ever met.” They “stab you in the back,” etc.

In any event, the wildfires, Mother Nature, and blame put me in mind of 2005 and Hurricane Katrina. In September of that year, I wrote a piece called “All the Uglier: What Katrina whipped up.”

Let me do a little quoting:

The first response of many to the destruction of New Orleans and other areas was to revile George Bush—and conservatism and Republicans and much else. Obviously, there are legitimate criticisms of the government, at all levels, to be made. In fact, a (conservative) friend of mine cracked, “We said we’d make Iraq look like the United States, and so we have.” But legitimate criticism has often been lost in spiteful lunacy. Katrina was an occasion to rehearse all of one’s fears and opinions and obsessions about the War on Terror, global warming, capitalism, the federal budget, race. Katrina was an invitation to bust a political gut.

One of the worst offenders was Robert F. Kennedy Jr., whom I quoted at some length. A man associated with the Left then, he had written an article for The Huffington Post. The villain for RFK Jr. was not a hurricane, or Mother Nature, but global warming, brought about by bad people.

What ever became of him, by the way?

As far as I can tell, Kennedy does not bang on about global warming anymore. It was his No. 1 concern. Today, he is a hero and fixture of the Republican Party. This is one of the strangest twists in a twisted political era.

Shortly after Hurricane Katrina hit, I was on the radio with another Katrina, Katrina vanden Heuvel, of The Nation. (Beautiful woman, incidentally.) She was banging on about Bush, the Republicans, etc.

At one point, all I could think to say was, “It was a hurricane.” Vanden Heuvel said, in a tone with a hint of concession in it, “I know.”

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***

I have given you a memory of 2005. How about a memory of 1985? A little Googling led me to this report in the Los Angeles Times, published on 1/10/85 (shortly before President Reagan’s second inauguration, I might note):

Sen. Jesse Helms is preparing a letter campaign to 1 million conservatives urging them to buy stock in CBS to take control of the television network and “become Dan Rather’s boss.”

(Dan Rather was for many years the anchorman of CBS News.)

Reading about CBS and its transformation a few days ago, I thought, “Helms must be smiling somewhere.”

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As long as I’m dredging up ancient history, let’s talk about character—as in “character in office” and “public virtue” and virtue at large. Character was a big, big deal where I lived, i.e., in the conservative and Republican world.

Young people may not believe it, but it’s true. I was there.

“Character is destiny,” we said. Peggy Noonan wrote a book called “When Character Was King.” It was about Reagan. William F. Buckley Jr. gave a speech titled “When Character Counted: The Importance of Ronald Reagan.” I could go on.

After 2016, everything was different. People who had spent years banging on about character now accused others of “moral preening” or “moral vanity.” People who had been the biggest scolds you ever saw now tagged others as “Trump scolds.”

They turned on a dime. I watched it happen, all around me.

I thought of this about-face when reading this article:

CNN reporter and anchor Kaitlan Collins has once again been targeted by President Donald Trump in a brutal jab about her appearance.

Trump compared Collins’s physical likeness to transgender influencer Dylan Mulvaney during his White House Correspondents’ Dinner speech on Friday night.

The president’s jibe did not end there, however, and on Sunday, he took to Truth Social to make the comparison between male-born Mulvaney and the CNN star again.

He shared an image of Collins’s face superimposed on Mulvaney’s body …

Conservatives were right the first time—about character and many, many other things. In fact, that would make a good title of a book: “Right the First Time.”

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***

Wasn’t I mentioning George Shultz in my column on Tuesday? I believe I was. Anyway, he has come to mind again.

(For the uninitiated, Shultz was secretary of state in the Reagan administration. Under Nixon, he had been labor secretary, budget director, and Treasury secretary.)

An op-ed in the Washington Post began,

Yale University’s board of trustees could soon decide on a possible ‘deal’ with the Trump administration … But to assign responsibility to a ‘board of trustees’ is to assign it to no one. Yale’s board members will own—as individuals—whatever Yale does next.

One day, Secretary Shultz said something like this: “People tell me, ‘The White House’ is calling. I say, ‘Who at the White House? The White House is a building.’”

I loved that.

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Care for a little language? A friend of mine shared with me a grotesquely ungrammatical sentence from an American newspaper. She said, “How could an editor have allowed that?”

I could only respond that the culture has declined.

Earlier this year, the secretary of homeland security said the following about Trump, to a television interviewer: “He’s the strongest leader of your and I’s time. Period.”

Period.

I mean, what can you do? Idiocracy is the state of the Union. If Bill Buckley were working today, he’d be denounced as an elitist and snob—which he was, by the kind of people who came to dominate the Right after he left.

I can’t end on so sour a note, can I? No, but I will. Bless you! Later.

If I hold a distinction among writers in America, it is this: I have not yet written about the new Odyssey movie. I have not seen it. Should that stop me from writing about it?

I would like to make a single point.

For the past couple of weeks, people have been arguing over the movie, and arguing over Homer’s epic poem. More than arguing, they have been fighting.

At The Bulwark, Joshua Tait published a long, searching essay on J. R. R. Tolkien and his Lord of the Rings. People have been arguing, and fighting, over that one too. Interpreting it this way and that. Claiming it.

Okay, my point: What more could a literary artist want than to have people arguing and fighting over his work, down the generations, down the centuries?

My gosh, what an achievement.

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***

When I mentioned The Lord of the Rings on social media, Garry Kasparov commented that he had used the book “as an example of how we accept the existence of pure evil in fiction but hesitate even to use the word in real life.”

Yes.

Kasparov is a chess champion and a democracy champion, as you know—a Russian dissident.

His words reminded me of Ronald Reagan’s “evil empire” speech in 1983. That rocked America. Many people thought it was appalling. Other people said, “About time a leader said this out loud.”

Henry Steele Commager, the eminent historian of the U.S., said, “It was the worst presidential speech in American history, and I’ve read them all.”

I’ll tell you something that George Shultz told me in an interview. We were talking about the “evil empire” speech, and Shultz recalled an exchange between a Democratic senator and Paul Nitze, the venerable diplomat, who was a particular expert on the Soviet Union.

The senator said something like, “How can you work for an administration whose president is so crude as to call the Soviet Union an ‘evil empire’?” Nitze answered, “Have you ever considered the possibility that it’s true?”

Reagan and the Reaganites were clear—unillusioned—about the Soviet Union. I have no doubt they would be the same way today about the Russian assault on Ukraine.

***

Maybe we could go back to literature for a second. A few days ago, I was looking into a piece by Norman Dello Joio, the American composer (1913–2008). He wrote a work called “Song of Affirmation,” setting Western Star, by Stephen Vincent Benét.

It came to me: All my life, I’ve sort of mixed Stephen Vincent Benét and Edna St. Vincent Millay. I’m sure I’ve said “Stephen St. Vincent Benét.”

Has anyone else had this problem, embarrassing as it is? Also, I can’t figure out what the accent is doing in Benét’s name …

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***

Back to world affairs, and the question of clarity versus cloudiness, and recognition versus delusion.

Last week, President Trump said, “I trust them.” He was referring to Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping. “I don’t think they want to have me disappointed,” he said.

You know, we Republicans and conservatives weren’t perfect pre-2016. But we were not dopes, we were not naïve, especially in the face of anti-American dictators.

***

Here is a message from the Republican National Committee:

Yes, Barack Obama’s middle name is “Hussein.” Did you know that? The RNC is *emphasizing* it. Does it shake you up?

Again, we Republicans weren’t perfect, before 2016. But we weren’t total bozos. We weren’t schoolyard louts.

***

Obama made some funny remarks about his middle name. Here he is at the 2008 Al Smith dinner:

Many of you know that I got my name “Barack” from my father. What you may not know is “Barack” is actually Swahili for “that one.” And I got my middle name from somebody who obviously didn’t think I’d ever run for president.

And here he is at the 2012 dinner:

… tonight is not about the disagreements Governor Romney and I may have. It’s about what we have in common—beginning with our unusual names. Actually, “Mitt” is his middle name. I wish I could use my middle name.

***

In recent years, I’ve written a lot about populism and a lot about language. (Well, I’ve been writing about language my whole career.) Those two subjects come together in Haley Stevens, the congresswoman from Michigan who’s running for her party’s Senate nomination. (Stevens is a Democrat.)

She featured in a column I wrote about language last week. And here she is the other day, in a campaign speech:

There’s those cool kids on the Internet. They’re doin’ the cool-kid chatter. Some of ’em might be the coastal elites, makin’ fun o’ how I talk. … But let’s be real: they’re makin’ fun of Michigan. They’re thinkin’ they’re better than us. And what they don’t know is, I am your voice. And their jokes, and their criticism, only makes me fight harder.

Pure, unalloyed populism: “They’re thinkin’ they’re better than us.”

Wouldn’t it be something if MAGA were beaten at their own game—their game being populism? Shtick countering shtick (and shtick is all it is, trust me).

***

A reader of ours writes in response to something I said in that above-linked column—the one about Haley Stevens and language. I wrote,

When I was growing up, I didn’t realize we Michiganders had an accent. Ours was a neutral American speech—anchorman English. Then I moved around a little and discovered this was not quite right.

Our reader tells me,

I am originally from Michigan and had the same sense that we were accentless. I had been in D.C. for a number of years and called Lansing in search of a birth certificate. The sound of the woman on the other end of the line brought enlightenment and a flood of nostalgia.

I have had similar experiences.

***

A friend of mine sent me this quiz, from the New York Times. It is a “dialect detector.” They ask 25 questions. Then they show you on a map where you’re (likely) from.

I answered the 25 questions. And those people zeroed right in. They placed me in southeastern Michigan. They practically gave my home address, of yore.

How the Sam Hill did they know?

Anyway, you may enjoy taking the quiz yourself.

***

A friend of mine sent me an article from Time magazine, published in September 1950. Listen:

Senator Burnet Maybank, in shirt sleeves and red-eyed with fatigue, marched across a deserted Capitol corridor and pounded on a chamber door. It was long after most Congressmen had gone home. There was a muffled response from inside the room. In a molasses accent, South Carolina’s Maybank shouted: “Aw right, we-ah ready.”

Love it.

Hang on, let’s have a peek at Burnet Rhett Maybank—in October 1939, leaving the White House, after a talk with President Roosevelt:

Nice to see you, my friends. Thanks so much. Talk with you soon.

On Friday, I circulated a piece titled “The Trump-Hegseth Military.” It warned of dragging our military into partisan and tribal politics. I would like to say a few more words.

Preparing that piece, I looked into some recent incidents (controversial ones) involving flyovers. Here’s the good news:

In every case, the commanding officers, in the Army and Navy, acted professionally. They suspended pilots. They began investigations. They followed procedure. They upheld standards. They observed our traditions and ethos.

Damn good news.

And the civilian leadership, the Trump appointees? All performative bro-ness.

I hope, and expect, that our military will outlast it.

***

That piece involved two themes of mine: patriotism and manliness. I hope for the recovery of a proper understanding of those things.

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In 2022, I wrote of a campaign event. I will recall it now. Kari Lake was running for governor of Arizona. She was the Republican nominee. Ron DeSantis, the governor of Florida, came to rally with her.

Introducing him, Lake said, “I’ll tell you what he’s got—I don’t know if you’ve heard of this—but he’s got BDE. Anybody know what that means? Ask your kids about it later.”

I had never heard of “BDE.” Lake meant “big d*** energy.” Pretty cool, huh?

She continued, coyly, “I call it ‘big … DeSantis energy.’ Right? He’s got the same kind of BDE that President Trump has. And frankly, he has the same kind of BDE that we want all of our elected leaders to have.”

***

One of the great dividing lines in America is over President Trump and manliness: Is he or isn’t he? Is he manly or not?

“Trump is a manly man.” That’s what the chairman of the Claremont Institute, the think tank in California, said.

Dick Cheney had a different view. “He is a coward,” said Cheney in 2022. “A real man wouldn’t lie to his supporters.” Cheney was talking about the 2020 election in particular.

***

Looking at a video a few days ago, I thought of my hometown of Ann Arbor. We had our own foreign policy—I mean, the city government did. That policy was pro-Sandinista.

New York mayor Zohran Mamdani made a video, in which he began, “Benjamin Netanyahu is a war criminal: the architect of a horrific genocide against the Palestinian people.”

I will say a few things. First, has there ever been a genocide that was non-“horrific”? Does the word “genocide” really need to be intensified?

Second, there’s a lot of work to do in New York. The subway is filthy. Mental illness abounds on the streets. Etc., etc.

Third, is what Mamdani said true? I don’t think it is. I think the charge of genocide against Israel is false and defamatory.

Let me return to language (I mentioned “horrific,” above): If the word “genocide” is devalued, we have done harm to an extremely important word, and concept.

What is the Chinese government doing to the Uyghurs? Some people think that Putin is guilty of attempted genocide in Ukraine: the destruction of a nation, culture, and people.

***

In reading about Iran, and our on-again, off-again war against it, I thought of the Carter Doctrine. This is something that President Carter enunciated in the 1980 State of the Union address:

Let our position be absolutely clear: An attempt by any outside force to gain control of the Persian Gulf region will be regarded as an assault on the vital interests of the United States of America, and such an assault will be repelled by any means necessary, including military force.

The Carter Doctrine, I’m afraid, is dead and buried—to the detriment of the United States, the Middle East, and the world at large.

***

In Stalin’s day, people were afraid to be the first to stop clapping—the first to stop clapping for the Big Man, Stalin.

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On Thursday, Aaron Rupar circulated a video, putting the following comment above it:

Cult sh** at the White House as Trump’s cronies give him a standing ovation for minutes on end. Note how nobody wants to be the first to stop clapping.

Republicans bristle at the phrase “personality cult,” understandably. But …

***

What do you make of this wording, with its capitalization?

***

It was time for the cabinet to praise the president. Said Howard Lutnick, the commerce secretary, “You are fixing everything with your policies. You have changed America and created the Golden Age.”

Mario Vargas Llosa wrote a novel called “The Feast of the Goat.” It’s about Trujillo and his dictatorship in the Dominican Republic. People talk to Trujillo in just the same way.

It’s uncanny, and creepy.

***

When I mentioned this on social media, Terry Moran, the veteran journalist, said, “Best political novel I’ve ever read.” Yes, a masterpiece.

***

Trujillo renamed his country’s capital city, Santo Domingo, after himself (“Ciudad Trujillo”). Our own national capital is named after our first president. Would Trump and his party dare try to change it? Trump put his name on another man’s memorial—the Kennedy Center. But maybe Washington, D.C., itself would be a step too far.

Penn Station seems within reach, though.

***

The other day, I thought of Sarah Palin. It was like hearing a dog not barking. (I’m not calling Palin a dog, I promise you.) For years, she was a big figure in America’s political life. And she has been absent from the Trump era, in which she might have been expected to fit in.

Curious.

***

A little language? During the World Cup, I thought of the adjective going with “Argentina”: “Argentinian”? “Argentine”? And if the latter, “teen” or “tyne”?

I tend to say “Argentinian” (whose alternative spelling is “Argentinean”).

In the cases of other countries, it’s simpler: “Brazilian.” “Bolivian.”

***

More language: The algorithm—the great Algo in the sky—fed me a clip from The Mary Tyler Moore Show. It showed Betty White’s character, Sue Ann Nivens, saying, “Everybody stay right where he is! We’re going to have a little meeting.”

Almost brought a tear to my eye. “Everybody stay right where he is!” That’s English. The “he” goes with “everybody,” and it’s not sex-specific.

(Every time I note something like this, people say to me, “Language evolves!” Really? I had no idea. Thank you so much.)

***

At the end of my column last Sunday, I mentioned Greenwich, the upscale (very) town in Connecticut. A reader writes,

Jay,

I grew up in Norwalk, also part of Fairfield County, but not as rich as Greenwich (or Darien or Westport). My late dad knew a lady who had been a high-school English teacher in Greenwich. She gave a test on The Merchant of Venice. One came back with the name of the character Portia spelled “Porsche.”

Only in Greenwich, the teacher told my dad!

Magnificent. Thanks for reading, y’all, and subscribing if you can/want. Talk to you soon.

In my column yesterday, I spoke of John Kennedy, the 35th president. In politics today, there is a John Kennedy from Louisiana—the junior senator from that state. Man, can he talk the populist talk.

Back in 2021, I wrote an essay called “Voices from Philistia: Notes on the politics and rhetoric of populism: then, now, and always.” I quoted a redolent passage from Kennedy, talking to Sean Hannity on Fox News:

“I think the American people are so tired—so tired—of being lectured by the managerial elite: the politicians, the media, the academics, the corporate phonies, the tuna-tartare crowd who live in the expensive condos with the high ceilings and the imported art on the wall, who think they’re better than the American people.”

Tuna tartare! Imported art! The unkindest cuts.

Kennedy has a gold-plated pedigree, which includes a degree from Magdalen College, Oxford, where students have valets, called “scouts,” and a deer park. Did he talk there as he talks to the folks on the bayou?

And is he sure that the folks on the bayou would mind?

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***

All of us, or most of us, have different modes of speech, depending on our audience, our mood, and so on. This is known as “code-switching.” Is it bad? Not necessarily. It can be fake and calculated, but it can also be perfectly natural.

In 1973, Governor Jimmy Carter of Georgia appeared on William F. Buckley Jr.’s Firing Line. After the show, the governor’s aides told WFB that they had never heard their boss speak as he had. He had refined his accent—had toned down the southern.

In later years, WFB wrote teasingly about Carter’s “Firing Line voice.”

You can see the episode in question here. To me, Carter sounds damn southern, as he always would.

A little aside, before I move on: I always thought that Bill Clinton was underrated for his raw intelligence, because of his southern accent.

***

In the 2008 cycle, Hillary Clinton was running for president. She gave a speech at First Baptist Church in Selma, Alabama, on the 42nd anniversary of Bloody Sunday. In her peroration, she quoted from a gospel song, “I Don’t Feel No Ways Tired.” She went very, very southern as she did so.

Across the country, many people hooted at her for this. Hillary Rodham Clinton, a white girl from the Chicago suburbs, was talkin’ black, like an ingratiating politician.

In response to this criticism, she said essentially this: Look, I’ve lived all over the place. Started in Chicago, went to college and law school in New England. Lived in Arkansas for 20 years, where I was the First Lady. Spent a lot of time in black churches. I’ve moved around, you know?

Americans do move around. Some people—not all, but some—adopt the speech patterns of their environment.

A big subject …

You know who enjoyed and cheered Clinton’s peroration? Her audience in Selma. That must be weighed in the balance, I would think.

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***

“Good to be here in my home state. Hit another one yesterday.” I am going from memory, but George Bush the Elder said something like that in his 1988 campaign for president. He had moved around a lot. Had several “home states.”

Born in Massachusetts. Raised in Connecticut. Lived in California for a bit. Made his career in Texas—a business career and a political career. Summered in Maine.

I may have left out an experience or two.

His speech was hard to place, a hybrid. It was his own, by which I mean, peculiar to him.

How about his children? I’m not sure about some of them, but I’m sure about George W. and Jeb. Jeb speaks a fairly “neutral” American English, I think. He has made his life and career in Florida.

W.? He was brought up in Midland, Texas, followed by Houston, but then you have to fold in Andover, Yale, and Harvard.

Like his father, W. has his own English, I think.

***

Race is a minefield in America. A frickin’ minefield. Here is a headline from September 2024: “Republicans Accuse Kamala Harris of Changing Her Accent Again.” (The article is here.) Was the vice president “talkin’ black” in front of a black audience?

If so—did she have … a right?

***

Let me quote from a New York Times report published in January 2010—hold on to your socks:

Senator Harry Reid, the Democratic majority leader, apologized on Saturday for once predicting that Barack Obama could become the country’s first black president because he was “light-skinned” and had “no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one.”

A minefield, race in America is.

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***

In my Washington Post article, published on Monday, and which I have been expanding the last two days, I wrote, “If race is our minefield, class is Britain’s.” Oh, yes. Let me quote some more.

Margaret Thatcher’s English was long a work in progress. The grocer’s daughter from Grantham adopted a posh accent. Then, when advisers deemed it de trop, she went back “down” a little.

Tony Blair occasionally spoke “Estuary English,” complete with glottal stops (whereby a bottle of beer becomes a “bo’le o’ beer”). A writer in the Daily Mail asked, “Why did the Prime Minister take reverse elocution lessons?”

***

On YouTube, you may enjoy an exchange that took place in Parliament about eight years ago. See it—and, more important, hear it—here.

The member for Glasgow East, David Linden, poses a question to the member for Mole Valley (Surrey), Paul Beresford. He poses it twice. With apologies, Beresford says he cannot understand the Glaswegian.

Solomonically, the speaker of the house, Lindsay Hoyle, suggests that the men resort to writing.

***

That Washington Post article, I ended with Reagan. He spent a long time in Hollywood. His speech was neutral, to my ears. But he was an Illinoisian, and sometimes the Midwest popped out.

In 1985, at a press conference, a reporter asked Reagan about a problem with his nose—a problem you could see. Said Reagan, “I picked at it and I squoze it and so forth and messed myself up a little.”

“Squoze it.” That is pure Huck Finn.

In 1983, a piqued Reagan had said, “I’ve had it up to my keister with these leaks.” Bill Buckley told me that never before then had he heard that word. He chuckled at the memory and shook his head affectionately, as if to say, “That Reagan.”

Me? I’d grown up with “keister” (which means rear-end).

***

Bill Buckley was frequently mocked and knocked for his speech. It was “affected,” people said. It was not quite American.

Well, WFB had an unusual upbringing: in New York, Connecticut, South Carolina, Latin America, England, France …

His father was from Texas, his mother from New Orleans.

Bill had nine siblings, and they did not all have the same speech. I knew four of them. Priscilla and Reid talked like Bill. Jim sorta did, I think. Carol did not, as I recall.

They were all wonderful. You know what Bill called Carol, the youngest Buckley? “Sweetie.”

Well, don’t get me to reminiscing. Thank you for joining me, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for subscribing, if you care to. Will see you right soon. (Not sure where “right soon” comes from, but it’s in my background.)

Haley Stevens set tongues a-wagging, on account of her tongue. She is a congresswoman from Michigan—a Democrat—and she is running for her party’s Senate nomination. On July 11, she gave a campaign talk that went viral. You can find it here.

Its “virality” did not come from what she said; it came from how she said it. Stevens spoke in a strong, strong accent. A Michigan accent? Well, more on that in a moment.

Across the nation, the congresswoman was mocked. One headline read, “Michigan Democrat Goes Viral for ‘Weird AF’ Campaign Speech—and Is Promptly Roasted.” (The article is here.)

A friend of mine at the Washington Post asked me to write a little piece about all this, which I have: here. Today, I’d like to “revise and extend my remarks,” as they say in Congress. For your entertainment? I hope.

***

In that “viral video,” was Haley Stevens, in fact, speaking in a Michigan accent? This is what I said in my Post piece:

To my Michigan-born ears, she was more idiosyncratic and personal than regional or local: a combination of the Upper Midwest and Betty Boop.

Some “roasters” online compared the “viral video” with other videos of Stevens, speaking less flamboyantly. But in those other videos, the “normal” ones? She still speaks in a markedly Michigan accent.

For example, on the word “economy.” How she pronounces the second syllable. I find it impossible to render this pronunciation in print, my apologies.

How do we Michiganders, when piqued, say “Dammit”? Again, I find it impossible to render in print. If you wanna hear it, call me up.

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***

When I was growing up, I wasn’t aware that Michiganders had an accent. I thought we spoke a neutral American English—anchorman English! But when I moved around a little …

In my Post piece, I mentioned Tom Price, who was a congressman from Georgia. In the first Trump administration, he served briefly as the secretary of health and human services.

One day, I was sitting with a group of journalists questioning Price. As I listened to him, I felt strangely homesick. He was talking pure Michigan.

When I got back to my desk, I Googled him. Yes, Price was born and raised in Michigan. Went to Atlanta to begin his career (in medicine, then politics).

***

In the summer of 2024, Gretchen Whitmer, the governor of Michigan, went on Stephen Colbert’s late-night show. A clip is here.

Being me, I could not help commenting on this in my column:

The content is not what I wish to discuss. It’s the speaking—redolent of Michigan. More than redolent, it screams, “Michigan!” Give particular attention to the words “actually,” “colleagues,” and “tie.”

Of course, we Michiganders have no accent at all (or so I thought until I got around a little).

***

Let’s move a little south and west for a minute—to Chicago. I remember Lynn Martin, a congresswoman. In the administration of Bush 41, she was labor secretary. One thing that was distinctive about her: a full-out Chicago accent.

Which I liked.

Barack Obama is an interesting case. He was born and raised in Hawaii, but he made his home and career in Chicago. He sometimes sounds like a Chicagoan—particularly when saying a plural word. Bear with me for a second.

And stick with the word “bear”—or rather, its plural. There was a recurring sketch on Saturday Night Live in which men said “da Bears.” (Here is a sample.) These guys were die-hard fans of their city’s NFL team, the Chicago Bears.

When I say “bears,” it comes out “bairz.” When a Chicagoan says it, it may well rhyme with “scarce.”

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***

Over the years, American speech has homogenized. This is the result of several things: television, prosperity, mobility. People move around. They marry people from elsewhere, their children speak differently …

This is a big topic.

In my Post piece, I wrote,

Regional distinctions persist, thank goodness. But, to a large degree, our speech has been put into a blender.

Let me quote a little more:

By the time I moved to New York in the late 1990s, traditional New York accents were thin on the ground, certainly in Manhattan. No more “Toidy-toid and Toid”—a cabbie’s way of saying “Thirty-third and Third.” Still, you could find some senior citizens who were New Yorky.

One was Gene Genovese, the historian. Another was John Sweeney, the labor leader.

Maybe I could quote some more:

At a conference, I encountered John Sweeney, the president of the AFL-CIO. I couldn’t place his accent. Smiling shyly, he told me, “I’m from the Bronx.” He was born in 1934, to Irish immigrants. He spoke in a rather lovely, almost musical way. That accent has died with him, I think.

Who has the New Yorkiest voice in American politics today? Well, a senator from (“from”) Vermont: Bernie Sanders, who was born in Brooklyn in 1941, three months before Pearl Harbor.

***

Move up from New York to Boston for a minute. In my lifetime, I have seen Boston accents virtually disappear. When I first knew Boston, in the mid-1980s, grandparents had accents. (You should have heard my landlady, Miss Marguerite Sugrue!) Their children had traces of accents. Their grandchildren, pretty much none.

And now …

Listen to clips of President Kennedy. He is shockingly regional, or local—especially for so worldly a man. Shockingly. That does not exist anymore.

***

Back to Miss Marguerite Sugrue, for an aside. She was not an actual grandparent, as the “Miss” has told you. She was what in former times was called a “maiden aunt.” Miss Sugrue was looked after by a nephew. She was a wonderful, unforgettable woman. She had a Boston-Irish accent for the ages.

***

Oh, we have a lot more to discuss, my friends. I think I should knock off for today and give you a Part II tomorrow. You know “code-switching”? Speaking in different modes to different people or audiences? Sometimes that is calculated and unnatural; other times it is perfectly human, natural.

We’ll get into that. Thanks and see you.

For about a month, I wrote an Italian journal, ending in Sicily. I published many photos, of Sicily and other places. But not one quite like this, from a reader:

The reader in question is Tom Jones, a former astronaut. He was on four Space Shuttle flights, including a 2001 flight on Atlantis. During that flight, the above photo was taken.

What are we lookin’ at? Sicily is on top. You can see Mount Etna, poking through the clouds. The sun glints on the Strait of Messina. On the other side of the strait—below Sicily—is the “toe of the boot” (the boot that is the Italian peninsula).

Now, that’s a perspective. Thank you, Tom Jones.

***

In Part XI of my journal, I wrote, “Have you ever seen a waterfall in the middle of town? I have not—until now.” I then showed a picture of Isola del Liri, a town in the Lazio region.

A reader says, in essence, “Whaddaya mean you had never seen one?” And he is right. He reminded me of the waterfall in his hometown, Rochester, N.Y. That would be High Falls, also called “Upper Falls.”

Our reader also reminded me of a place in South Dakota—Sioux Falls. Right!

Here is another line from my Part XI: “In the area is a barbershop with an English name: ‘The Men’s Room.’ Um, I would have advised something else …”

Well, let’s hear again from that same reader: “Rochester has a barbershop called … ‘The Men’s Room.’ My sister used to cut hair there. Can’t say I didn’t tease her about it.”

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***

In Part X, I wrote,

Cities sometimes get nicknames: “City of Lights” (Paris). “Eternal City” (Rome). These names can be kind of dorky. But, you know? There is an air, a feeling, of eternality about Rome.

A friend of mine from Lubbock, Texas, writes,

Lubbock is the “Hub City.” Whole lotta nowhere, and Lubbock is right in the middle of it.

!!

***

Back to Part XI—in which I aired a pet peeve:

At Roma Termini—the main rail station in the capital—I see the Leonardo Express. It runs to and from the main airport. And it makes me think of a lost cause of mine.

Italians refer to the painter as “Leonardo.” If they want a fuller name, they say “Leonardo da Vinci.” Americans have learned, somehow, to say “da Vinci.” I’m afraid there is nothing to be done about it.

It’s like calling William of Orange “of Orange.”

Michelangelo’s full name is “Michelangelo Buonarroti.” But we never call him “Buonarroti.” Thank heaven for small mercies.

“Not so fast,” says a reader (in so many words). Have I ever seen The Agony and the Ecstasy, the 1965 movie starring Charlton Heston as Michelangelo and Rex Harrison as Pope Julius II? No, I haven’t. Well, the Pope says such things as, “The audience is over, Buonarroti!”

Huh.

***

Upon returning from Italy, I thought of something Richard Starr said, many years ago. He was one of my managing editors at The Weekly Standard. Most people think of reading about a place before they go there, he said. He liked reading about places after he had been there.

I know the feeling.

The other day, I brought up this matter with him. He said it was a hard thing to analyze. “I explained it once to someone as the difference between trying to watch an episode of a soap opera you have never seen versus tuning in to one you have been watching for years.”

That gets to it, yes.

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***

Pause for a little language? Home in New York, I encountered this awning, at a restaurant:

“Eccolo” means “Here it is.” That accent, on the awning, is all wrong. Maybe they want you to stress the first syllable? That is right. But their acute accent signals an “ay” sound, as in “hay.” The “ecc” in “eccolo” rhymes with “heck,” basically—so “Èccolo” would be more appropriate.

Anyway, here is another sign, at the restaurant:

Yes!

***

In the block next to me, in front of a movie complex, a strange, large horse went up:

That was for the premiere of Christopher Nolan’s Odyssey.

***

A banner at the Union Theological Seminary (affiliated with Columbia University):

“Blessed are the Activists.” Do you agree? Some are, some aren’t.

***

I took a watch in to have a battery replaced. I took it to the company itself—the company that made the watch. This is important to know.

I said to the nice lady, “How long should I expect the new battery to last?” She said, “A year, year and a half.” “Is that all?” I said. “They lasted a lot longer before, didn’t they?”

“Yes,” she said, “but they make crap now. Everything is crap. Nothing lasts, the way it used to.”

I was so glad she said that. Glad for the candor, I mean.

***

Here is a little sports action I had never encountered in New York before:

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I had never noticed this—a little statue, a little monument—in front of a firehouse:

***

More and more, I see families, begging together. Often, it’s a mother, sitting with her son (or a boy I presume to be her son). The son is apt to be looking at his phone while his mother begs.

What will be the effect on him?

***

It is a hot, sweltering day. There are vendors on the sidewalk, with their booths side by side. A woman has plastic cups of cut-up watermelon. A man, her neighbor, wants one. “How much?” he asks. “Six dollars,” she answers. He says—yells—“Come on! I’m poor vendor like you!”

A striking line, one that sticks with me.

***

A man walks by in a T-shirt, which says, “Picked Last in Gym.” Forlorn.

***

Somewhat unconsciously, I feign a golf swing. A woman walks by with her children, and without breaking stride she says, “Nice shot.”

I would have liked to imagine.

***

I have reason to go to Greenwich—the tony town bordering Stamford, in Connecticut. Bill Buckley lived in Stamford. He would say, “George Washington mentions Stamford in his diaries only once. ‘Breakfasted in Stamford. Not as good as Greenwich.’”

Then Bill would grin that singular grin.

Well, happy Sunday to you, my friends, and all the best, always.

For details, go here.

He has also uncovered eye-popping things about North Korea and Iran, and their exploitation of cryptocurrency.

Alexander is the son of Bill Browder—Sir William Browder—the financier who has devoted his life to opposing Putin and his dictatorship. In 2018, I wrote a piece: “A Family in History: The strange odyssey of the Browders.”

At the end of our conversation, I tell Alexander that I’m worried about him. Bill has long been in the crosshairs of the Kremlin, and now this teenage Browder has rattled the Kremlin’s cage too?

Says Alexander, “I think that if you live in fear, it really constricts you and what you are able to do.” Think of the people in Ukraine, he says, who are assaulted by Putin’s military daily. “So, if I can have any effect, why shouldn’t I be doing something?”

An amazing young man, and a chip off the old block.

Dear readers: The previous parts of this journal can be found at the following links: I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, VIX, X, XI, XII, XIII, XIV, XV, XVI, XVII, XVIII. The journal concludes today.

Earlier in this journal, when I was writing from Syracuse, I said I was glad to see a basketball court by the water. I see one by the water in Palermo too. But the thing is: the court is astroturf. Which is a little odd.

Still, long live hoops.

***

Another sight glimpsed along the water: a huge graffito that says, “Tourism kills the city.” Is that true? I imagine there are arguments either way. I imagine that tourism both helps and hurts the city.

Where does the balance lie?

***

Italy is great for food, and Sicily is particularly great for food, and Palermo? Best of all, some people say. I am not a “foodie” (though I’m an appreciative eater). I am not a connoisseur. But I know a few, and I’ve read a few.

Palermo is famous for arancine, which are rice balls, or rice croquettes, filled with this and that. Is it “arancine” or “arancini”? Well, it depends on where you are. In Palermo and western Sicily, you eat arancine, and in the east of the island, you eat arancini. (The respective singulars are “arancina” and “arancino.”)

Moreover, arancine in the west are spherical whereas arancini in the east are conical.

To a Michigander like me? They all go down good …

Palermo is also famous for cannoli. I have had a few of these in my time. But not until I got to Palermo did I realize how a cannolo ought to be: light, not heavy; sweet but moderately so.

What a delicious dessert …

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Speaking of which: they have setteveli ice cream here. It’s available in almost every parlor. I will quote an online source for a description:

Setteveli is a gelato flavor inspired by the eponymous cake from Palermo. The cake combines chocolate sponge, praline crunch, hazelnut cream, and chocolate mousse. … “Setteveli” translates as “seven veils,” and both the cake and the gelato flavor were named after the Dance of the Seven Veils that Salome performed before Herod.

***

I see “Libreria Dante”—“Dante Bookstore.” A good name for a bookstore, right? (True, libreria looks like “library,” but it means bookstore, and a library is a “biblioteca.”)

***

In the center of Palermo is a memorial, and a kind of museum, called “No Mafia.” It commemorates the victims of the Mafia. It explains what the Mafia is, as contrasted with popular mythology.

Before I proceed, let me share a picture:

I stand at the entrance, hesitating to go in. Meanwhile, I have a nice chat with the young woman who is welcoming visitors.

Finally, I say to her, “Would you know what I meant if I said the following? I’m glad that No Mafia exists for other people. But I myself don’t need it.”

For a moment, she is perplexed, but she then says, “Ah, what you mean is: you know how bad the Mafia is and don’t need to be instructed on the subject.” Yes. What’s more, I know that an engagement with the memorial would incense me.

In yesterday’s installment, I wrote, “Later in this journal, I will unload on the Mafia and all of its romanticizers and rationalizers. The Mafia are evil incarnate.”

Today, I’ve realized that I have more like a separate article to write about this. If I began, it would take over, and overwhelm, this final installment of my journal.

Let me record this, however: I tell the young woman at No Mafia that I remember very well the murders of Falcone and Borsellino. These murders were committed before she was born.

Giovanni Falcone and Paolo Borsellino were judges from Palermo—incredibly brave. They devoted themselves to upholding the rule of law in their city. The Mafia murdered Falcone on May 23, 1992, and murdered Borsellino about two months later, on July 19.

The murder weapon in each case was a car bomb. While murdering Falcone, they also murdered his wife, Francesca Morvillo, who was also a judge. In addition, they murdered three police officers assigned to protect the couple: Rocco Dicillo, Antonio Montinaro, and Vito Schifani.

While murdering Borsellino, they also murdered five officers in his security detail: Agostino Catalano, Walter Cosina, Vincenzo Li Muli, Claudio Traina, and Emanuela Loi.

The last of these was the first Italian policewoman to be killed in the line of duty. She was 24.

I could go on but should stop.

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***

I’m glad to see a high school—a liceo scientifico, a science academy—named after Benedetto Croce. He was an interesting liberal, and Liberal: a member of the Italian Liberal Party, now defunct. Indeed, for three years he was the leader of it. Croce was a philosopher, a historian, a politician—all those things.

***

I am very, very glad to see a street named after Abraham Lincoln.

***

And I’m amused to see Via delle Case Nuove—“Street of the New Houses.” I wonder how old those houses are. I think of New College, Oxford—founded in 1379.

***

The Teatro Massimo is the largest opera house in Italy. Let’s have a quick look:

The house opened in 1897, with a performance of Verdi’s Falstaff. Later in that season, Enrico Caruso sang (in Ponchielli’s Gioconda). The house is located on Verdi Square, and a bust of the composer is on the grounds. Who those little fellows around him are, I’m afraid I can’t tell you:

The Teatro Massimo was closed for 24 years—1974 to 1997—because of the Mafia and its wicked influence. It reopened in time for the centennial. On that occasion, the Berlin Philharmonic played a concert, conducted by Claudio Abbado.

Said Abbado, “Reopening is important for music in Palermo, in Italy, in Europe, and in the world.” But there was a lot more, for him.

“What I wish to remember most is that my mother was a palermitana”—a native of Palermo—“and now I can be proud to say that. For the last 24 years I was ashamed to say that, because the Mafia had covered Palermo with shame.”

On this particular night, I’m attending a concert that features the Teatro Massimo’s chorus. (Review at The New Criterion to follow.) One member of that chorus is Enrico Caruso—I kid you not. That’s the man’s name. He is a bass, rather than a tenor.

***

A night scene, with diners al fresco:

***

Early the next morning, women on balconies empty their cleaning buckets down onto the streets. Palermitane must have been doing this for … how many years? Centuries?

***

A couple of men, shirtless and paunchy, cast fishing lines into the marina. They have their rod in one hand and a cigarette in the other.

***

I head for the Palermo airport—which is called “Aeroporto Falcone Borsellino,” in honor of the martyred judges.

***

My friend Anthony Daniels, the British writer, says that he likes being a foreigner. He has traveled all over and has frequently lived abroad. For one thing, he says, the problems of other countries don’t bother you as much as the problems of your own. You can view them with a certain detachment.

I know just what he means.

***

In my month here, people have been very kind to me—Italians from Milan way down to Reggio Calabria, and then over and down into Sicily. They have been patient with my Italian, helpful with logistics, generous with information. I’m talking about men and women, old and young.

I am grateful. And to you, my friends and readers. Thank you.

Dear readers: The previous parts of this journal can be found at the following links: I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, VIX, X, XI, XII, XIII, XIV, XV, XVI, XVII.

All over Italy, announcements in train stations say the same thing: Don’t cross the tracks. Whatever you do, don’t cross the tracks. The announcements are near constant. First they are in Italian, then in English: Don’t cross the tracks!

You are to take an underground passageway instead.

Except in Enna, here in the middle of Sicily. At Enna, you cross the tracks. There is no underground passageway. I can tell you that it feels very, very weird to cross train tracks after you have had almost a month of announcements—in two languages—telling you: You’d better not.

Care to see a picture of the track situation at Enna?

***

To get to Palermo from Enna, you switch trains at Caltanissetta Xirbi. That second word, that second name, is strange, right? There is no “x” in the Italian alphabet at all. This is pure dialect, or perhaps even a separate language (and delightsome to me).

Xirbi is a hamlet near Caltanissetta, population about 20. (You read that right.) I check with a conductor to be sure how to pronounce “Xirbi”—something like “Kseerbee.”

***

About Palermo, there is a mystique. The city is beguiling, dangerous, lawless, sensual, wild, wily, passionate, beautiful, ugly …

It’s all true. The one thing Palermo is not is dull—although it is capable of serenity, especially at night.

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***

In Palermo, you will take in heavenly smells and foul smells. It is a place of extremes, I would say (though with a moderate middle).

***

To get to my hotel, I trudge through Ballarò—the Ballarò market. It is a market, yes—an outdoor market, a street market, with endless stalls selling food. But it is also a scene, a party. Sometimes, it resembles a discotheque, with music pounding—with dancing, singing, performing.

It is loud, colorful, raucous. Video would do Ballarò more justice, but I don’t think you can post video on Substack. May I throw a few pictures at you?

***

In Palermo, there is a great variety of people—long has been (as in Sicily at large). The city is sort of an ethno-nationalist’s nightmare. There are Arabs, black Africans, South Asians, Orientals (as we said in the bad old days) …

Then there are people who are sort of American, sort of Sicilian. One vendor says something to me in pure American English. I say, “You’re an American.” He says, “Born here. But you got me: grew up in Pennsylvania.” “You sound red, white, and blue to me,” I tell him. He says, “Thanks, my man.”

***

Who’s this?

That’s Saint Benedict—a.k.a. Benedict the Moor, or Benedict the Black, or Benedict of Palermo. He lived from 1526 to 1589.

***

I see a lot of kids out playing—kicking a ball around, chiefly. I think, “These are not screen kids”—kids looking at screens. I also notice that they tend to be dark kids. I wonder whether they have phones or tablets to look at.

***

A church, bathed in light—this is Santa Maria della Catena, in the neighborhood known as “Castellammare”:

***

A typical street, with a stylish young woman walking down it—a woman with “attitude,” a woman with “swag”:

You know a song lyric: “There she was just a-walkin’ down the street.”

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***

Care to see the marina? (This is toward evening.)

***

Some buildings are simply decayed—but you can imagine them as they were, and you can imagine them rejuvenated:

***

We are in the world—part of the world—of The Leopard, the novel by Lampedusa—Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa—written in the mid 1950s. I have commented on this novel in several articles over the years—this one, for instance.

***

An old park is called “Piersanti Mattarella Park.” Well, I am thinking like an American when I say “old”—it was built in 1851. It was called the “Giardino Inglese,” the “English Garden.”

One man honored in the park, with a bust, is Pirandello—Luigi Pirandello, the versatile writer who in 1934 won the Nobel prize. Two of my professors, years back, devoted a fair amount of their careers to Pirandello. When people you esteem, esteem someone else—you sit up and pay attention to that someone else.

I want to show you a bust of Garibaldi, in the foreground, and then comment on the bust behind him and to the left:

The latter bust is of Nicolae Balcescu, a Romanian who lived in the first half of the 19th century. What was he? Many things: solider, political leader, historian, journalist. He is associated with the Wallachian Revolution of 1848. On the run and in exile, he died here in Palermo at 33.

On the day I visit the park, someone has left a banner and a wreath in Romanian colors at the monument. I have noticed several Romanian visitors in town.

A fountain in the park doubles as a turtle pond. The all-knowing Internet tells me that these turtles are yellow-bellied sliders. (“Yellow-bellied” is commonly an epithet.) There are also huge, primitive-looking banyans—here’s one:

I have not explained how the English Garden came to be called “Piersanti Mattarella Park.” Piersanti Mattarella was an Italian politician—the president of Sicily’s regional government—who was murdered by the Mafia in 1980. His younger brother Sergio has been president of Italy since 2015.

Later in this journal, I will unload on the Mafia and all of its romanticizers and rationalizers. The Mafia are evil incarnate.

***

Above, I said something about thinking like an American. Well, here’s another instance: When I see a gas station, I think, “Drinks.” I think of a little store, where you can buy drinks and snacks. In Italy—certainly in Sicily—this is not necessarily so. These gas stations just sell … gas.

The audacity.

***

But I find—I stumble into—the best drink I’ve ever had. Certainly one of them. And perfect on a hot, hot day.

Sicily is the home of granitas. I have never much liked granitas. In America, granitas tend to be crushed ice with sickly syrup poured in.

Well, here in Palermo, I have a granita all right—but with fresh-squeezed orange juice. The freshly squeezed o.j. is in finely crushed ice.

Goodness gracious sakes alive, as we used to say in Michigan …

***

In the evening, in the heart of town, a man serenades passersby from his balcony. I have taken a video but can’t post it. But here is a photo from the video, to give you a sense:

You are really nice to join me. Thank you, everybody, and talk to you soon, when I’ll wrap up.

Dear readers: The previous parts of this journal can be found at the following links: I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, VIX, X, XI, XII, XIII, XIV, XV, XVI.

In this journal a few days ago, I scribbled, “Catania is in the shadow of Mount Etna. ‘Shadow’ can sound ominous—and I mean it to. Sucker’s liable to blow at any moment.”

You know that sucker did blow, the day after I left Catania (for Syracuse)? Yes. Didn’t hurt anybody, but threw its ash and whatnot into the air, complicating flights to and from Catania Airport.

Etna is a dangerous, temperamental beast.

***

I’ll tell you what is nice: Augusta. Augusta, here on the east coast of Sicily. As nice as the golf course in Georgia, where the Masters is played? Well, different.

I’m glad I’ve seen both …

***

Not that you asked, but I’ve just eaten the best plum of my life. It’s an astonishingly flavorful sugar bomb. A phrase comes to mind: “a peach of a plum.”

***

Whether we like it or not, there are sex differences. At least I think so. Let me suggest one: Men detest meetings; women either like them or don’t mind so much. If a meeting involves men only, it’s likely to be very brief (mercifully so).

May I suggest—no, state—another one? Well, women “run cold” while men run hot, or less cold.

On a train, there is an old Sicilian couple. The man is grumpy and gruff; his wife appears to me longsuffering. The day is hot, but the train is air-conditioned.

The man is in a white short-sleeved shirt and is wearing white shorts. The woman wears a long-sleeved shirt and a skirt. A minute or two into the journey, she gets out a sweater and puts it on. She then clutches herself, shivering.

***

I’m switching trains at the Catania Airport station. I happen to glance in the distance and there’s Mount Etna, smoking. Having a smoke, after its latest eruption.

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***

On this next train, there is a conductor who speaks good English—American English. She has learned it from TV shows and movies, primarily. When she finds out I’m American, she’s amazed. She doesn’t meet many Americans in these parts.

“These parts”? We are headed deep into central Sicily, the Sicilian heartland, if you will.

She is doubly—triply—amazed that I live in New York. She would very much like to go there. But money is an issue.

In a few weeks, however, she’ll go to Berlin, where her sister lives. There, she can use her English.

She comes from a small town in the vicinity of Palermo. She could not wait to bust out of that town. She has, living in Caltanissetta—which is also a small town, but which is (a) notably beautiful and (b) different (different from what she had before).

In the past month, I have been in many small towns, which are interesting and charming to a traveler. But I understand why kids want to bust out of them. I understand it very well.

***

My destination is Enna, a mountain town, very beautiful. It’s in the center of the center of Sicily. It has sometimes been called the “navel” of Sicily. You wanna know how high this baby is? Almost a thousand meters, about 3,100 feet.

That may not be high to a Coloradan, but it’s high to me.

***

Let me give you a shot from sort of Lower Enna, looking out:

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Enna is the “Città della Gentilezza”—the “City of Kindness”—or so says the sign (the welcome sign). That’s a nice designation (no pun intended).

***

Again, people are amazed that I’m here—I mean, not me personally, but an American. I don’t see many of us in town.

Enna is not the simplest to get to, it’s true.

***

Dry cleaning, I’ve heard of. “Wet cleaning” is kind of a new one on me …

***

One store is open all day, pretty much, except for one hour: from 2 to 3. That’s what the sign on the door says. A phrase from an opera comes to mind: “dalle due alle tre.” That’s when Falstaff arranges his assignation with Alice, in the Verdi opera: “from 2 to 3.” (Doesn’t work out for the poor guy.)

***

Wanna give you a shot of some local produce:

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Here’s a neat street:

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“Monticello,” as in Jefferson’s home, means “little mountain.” I’m not sure the mountain on which Enna sits is little, but there is a Monticello Street (Via Monticello).

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***

A view from on high:

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You know, it’s cool up here—and I don’t mean “hip.” The temperature is lower, and pleasanter, here than it is below.

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About my speed—a game I can play:

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Lombardy Castle is the symbol of this town. It was built, in stages, from the 10th century to the 14th. Outside the castle is a war memorial, commemorating local men who were killed in the world wars. The names have been allowed to wear off, over time.

I don’t think this should be so.

***

This is somewhat awkward, somewhat painful. A sign tells us that a certain piece of ground is dedicated to the memory of Giovanni Palatucci, a Righteous among the Nations, credited with saving thousands of Jews. He was a police official in Fiume (i.e., Rijeka, Croatia). He died at Dachau in February 1945.

Did he, in fact, perform the deeds that he is credited with? There is now doubt about this, and a historical commission is investigating.

***

Here at the castle is something dramatic, and inspiring, I would say: Eunus, breaking the chains of slavery in the 2nd century, B.C.

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Stick with antiquity: A plaque denotes the place where Cicero lived, when he was prosecuting Gaius Verres on behalf of Enna.

Gaius Verres was corruption personified.

***

Near Cicero’s place is a grocery store. There is an image of Jesus behind the cash register. A mother is working, with her daughter nearby. The daughter knows a little English and wants to practice it. I ask her how she’s doing. She’s doing fine. “I love you!” she exclaims. (“You don’t know him,” her mother admonishes, in Italian.)

The mother, the cashier, is delighted to learn I live in New York. She and her husband have been there … six times. From right here in hard-to-get-to Enna.

Some like New York, some don’t. I have heard from both, for years …

***

Bear with me a second: A friend of mine told me a story, some years ago. A black American documentarian had made a documentary about black Americans. My friend heard this fellow interviewed on the radio.

The interviewer asked a strange but interesting question: “What do you like best about black people?” The documentary-maker answered, “Their laughter.”

I think of this here in Italy. I like their laughter—the Italians’ laughter. It is hearty, unembarrassed, unselfconscious.

***

Lower down in Enna, the last of the day’s light:

Let’s head to Palermo, okay? Talk to you soon. Thank you so much.

Dear readers: The previous parts of this journal can be found at the following links: I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, VIX, X, XI, XII, XIII, XIV, XV.

You may remember what a man in Reggio Calabria told me: that Syracuse (or “Siracusa,” in this country) is his favorite city in Europe. That is startling, right? In light of Paris, Rome, Prague …

You know, I get it. I understand him.

Syracuse is beautiful, in land and sea. It is beautiful in the man-made as well as the natural. Syracuse is very interesting, in historical and other terms. The food is delicious. The people are warm.

I could be describing many, many cities in Italy and elsewhere in the world, right? Yes, but in Syracuse, you have all that in concentrated form.

Anyway—a hit of a city.

***

There are blooming trees lining the streets. The place is all decked out, as if in welcome.

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Street names are the same as in most any Italian city: “Garibaldi,” “Cavour,” “Mazzini” … But they are also Greek: “Socrates,” “Aristotle,” “Plutarch” …

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Through a park, you can see a pantheon. Or is it a church? It’s both. This is the Church of San Tommaso al Pantheon.

***

In the archeological park, you have things Greek, things Roman—things alluringly classical:

There are two theaters in the park: a Greek and a Roman. Let me show you a picture of the latter and then make a comment:

I swear, this makes me think of Michigan Stadium, in my hometown. Same basic shape, same basic concept.

You can take the boy out of Ann Arbor, but …

***

Behold a cave, known as the Ear of Dionysius. The acoustics are famous here. I sing a little something—there’s no one else around—and sound almost good …

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You need to cool off?

***

I am not quite ready for a drink and a snack, but I pass a sidewalk café at which nine men are crowded around a table for four. They are yakking away, in what I take to be siciliano siracusano. In age, they range from about 50 to 80. I take the table next to them and listen intently. I get … 15 percent of it? They are talking mainly about family: sons-in-law, daughters-in-law, others.

This session is a mixture of fraternity and therapy …

***

Syracusan pasta—e.g., spaghetti alla siracusana—is different and flavorful. It is a little fishy, a little crunchy—unique, in my experience. People have written at length about this, but maybe I could just show you a quick photo?

***

The Italian way of saying “to retire”—as in to retire from working life—is “to go into pension,” “andare in pensione.” I quite like the below poster: “Life does not retire, does not go into pension”:

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An alley cat—a literal cat in an alley—has found a shaft of sun:

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I meet a young couple from London. University-aged, I think. They are spending a month in Sicily—Sicily alone. That is a smart choice, I think. They will read deeply, so to speak, while I am kind of skimming …

London is my favorite city, I tell them. I’m not sure about the young woman, but the young man is ready to bust out of London. He has a yen for New York. I understand him.

But I also think that, when he is older, he will appreciate London like all get-out.

Don’t most people, or many people, wanna bust out of where they’re from, even if where they’re from is someplace that many other people would like to get to?

But a lot of people want to remain where they have always been. I understand them too.

***

A quick culinary observation: Some shops have cannoli, laid out and ready to go. Others have just the shells laid out—and they will fill them when you order.

Which seems right …

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That genius Archimedes—mathematician, engineer, etc.—was from here in Syracuse. Archimedes Square is a very pleasant place, maybe especially on a summer evening.

Just a quick shot:

***

I encounter a kid—13 or so—in a Lakers jersey. No. 23. “LeBron James,” I say. Yup, his favorite player. I tell him that I first knew LeBron as a Cavalier—a Cleveland Cavalier. This is easy to say in Italian: LeBron was a Cavaliere.

This young fellow is amazed that I know this ancient history—almost as old as Archimedes: LeBron James as a Cleveland Cavalier … (He had two stints in Cleveland, of course.)

***

On buses, you see the acronym “SAIS.” In my little world, back home, it stands for the School of Advanced International Studies. Here, it stands for the primary Sicilian bus service.

***

“Have laptop, will travel.” A headset is handy too. Bill Kristol has asked me to do a podcast, and it is a pleasure to oblige. I’ve been talking with him since the mid-1990s—about politics, history, music, literature, Al Kaline …

This podcast is here. Plenty of Italy, plenty of America, a fair amount of literature. No baseball. It’s World Cup time anyway. The All-Star break is next week.

Thank you so much for joining me, my friends—for subscribing and all that. See you up in the mountains, in my next installment.

Dear readers: The previous parts of this journal can be found at the following links: I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, VIX, X, XI, XII, XIII, XIV.

There was, or is, a license-plate slogan: “Wild, Wonderful West Virginia.” I think “Wild, Wonderful Sicily” would do too.

***

“To have seen Italy without having seen Sicily is not to have seen Italy at all, for Sicily is the clue to everything”—said Goethe.

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Sometimes, when you travel down the eastern coast from Messina, the train hugs the water—which is pleasant.

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Bear with me a second: I think of the phrase “timelessness-plus.” In Sicily, there are olive groves and goats, plus Wi-Fi.

***

On a train, I meet an older couple who have long lived in Venice but are from here in Sicily. Interesting, kind, and knowledgeable people. The man says, “Have you read Goethe on his travels in Italy?”

I have read about that book; I have not read it. I can say that about far too many books …

We also talk about the popularity of Taormina among tourists. The lady says, “It’s a mystery why some places become popular and other places don’t. Capri is another example. A lovely island, yes. But there are so many …”

***

In Catania, I stay on Claudio Monteverdi Street. Monteverdi was more or less the father of opera (and he lived from 1567 to 1643). The next street over is named for Francesco Cilea, a composer who lived from 1866 to 1950.

But Catania is really Vincenzo Bellini’s town. He was born here in 1801. He was known as the “Swan of Catania.” Richard Wagner called him “the sweet Sicilian.”

He stands in the middle of town:

Bellini died at 33. Mozart died at 35. It has often been asked, “What would Mozart have gone on to do?” The same question can be asked of Bellini.

He did so much, in his time here …

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***

At home, do we honor our composers? I have lived in New York for many years. I have never seen a statue of Aaron Copland or George Gershwin, both of them New York–born. Maybe I have missed them …

(I should mention that there is a statue of Verdi out my window. In New York, I mean.)

***

One barbershop in Catania is called “Il Barbiere di Sicilia”—“The Barber of Sicily.” (Rossini’s opera, you remember, is called “Il Barbiere di Siviglia,” “The Barber of Seville.”)

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In Catania, there’s a lot of life. What do I mean, “life”? Vitality. Energy. People bustling, animated conversations, kids kicking balls around …

***

On Saturday, the market is really bustling. It is an outdoor market, with tons of produce, plus clothes and other needs.

Let’s look in on one stand:

You may have noticed the graffiti on the wall behind them. If there is a wall in Italy free of graffiti, I have not seen it. A blight, nationwide.

***

The university here is called the “Università degli Studi”—the “University of Studies.” To me, that is a redundancy and a curiosity, but it must ring differently in Italian.

Handsome place, regardless:

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The symbol of Catania? Not a swan—not Bellini—but an elephant. An elephant on a fountain. There are stories and explanations concerning this elephant, but let’s just show him instead (and if the elephant is not a “him,” my apologies):

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A typical scene:

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Remember I was saying earlier in my journal that Frida—Frida Kahlo—is everywhere? Everywhere I go, on whatever continent? Well …

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Catania is in the shadow of Mount Etna. “Shadow” can sound ominous—and I mean it to. Sucker’s liable to blow at any moment.

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***

One hotel in this city is called “Gattopardo House.” The first word surely alludes to Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa’s classic novel of 1958, Il gattopardo, or The Leopard.

The author himself was Sicilian but not from Catania. He was from Palermo—where we will be in due course.

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For all the traffic, there are not many stoplights here in Catania. There are crosswalks. Drivers practice a weave-and-dodge method.

At one crosswalk, I hesitate—a motorcycle gang is coming. The lead biker slows and calls out to me, “Prego”—“Please, go ahead.”

A courteous gang. Not the Hell’s Angels.

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A couple of little girls, with their mother, want to practice their English. More like show it off. I don’t blame them—it is impressive English, adorably intoned.

We talk about a great Disney trilogy: The Little Mermaid, Beauty and the Beast, and Aladdin.

When we part, the girls wanna high-five me. So, it’s high fives all around.

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I can’t say there’s a Chinatown—a proper Chinatown—here. But there are Chinese families and a number of shops …

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There are also Sri Lankans. One sign says “Voice of Sri Lankans” (in English). It is a community association. Next to it, a shop is labeled—in Italian—“Ceylon Foods International.”

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But let’s talk Catanian cuisine—and in particular, pasta alla Norma, which has gone all around the world. Eggplant, tomato sauce, ricotta, maybe a touch of basil …

A delicious plate is set before me. The ingredients could not be fresher.

Does fresh ’n’ local make a difference? Believe the hype (most of it): it does.

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Catanians, Sicilians, other Italians—they eat late. Where I’m from, the Midwest, 7 is late. Here, we’re talkin’ … 10:30?

Anyway, some diners-out:

And a winding-down, even later, when the streets are serene but still hummin’ a bit:

Should I just hum my way out of here and let you get on with your day? Thank you for joining me, everybody. Appreciate it.

Dear readers: The previous parts of this journal can be found at the following links: I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, VIX, X, XI, XII, XIII.

A hundred miles south of Naples is Maratea, on the western coast of the Italian peninsula. It’s known as the “Pearl of the Tyrrhenian.” It is listed in a bible of Italian travel: I Borghi più belli d’Italia, or “The Most Beautiful Villages in Italy.”

About this “Tyrrhenian” business: Habitually, people like me speak of the “Adriatic” side of the peninsula and the “Mediterranean” side. But that is a mistake. At least it’s an inconsistency.

The Adriatic Sea is part of the Mediterranean. A branch of it, if you will. The Tyrrhenian Sea is part of the Mediterranean. Further up is the Ligurian Sea.

But all of these seas are Mediterranean.

I find it a little confusing, to be honest …

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When it comes to places, there are different types of beauty. There are different types of beauty when it comes to people, too. Maratea is hard to beat. Is it more beautiful than, say, deserts in New Mexico or Arizona?

Again, apples and oranges. We are lucky to have all types of beauty.

Let me show you a cove in Maratea:

Here’s a shot through the woods:

Maybe you can take one more? Broader?

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A poem comes to mind:

Kennst du das Land, wo die Zitronen blühn,
Im dunklen Laub die Gold-Orangen glühn …?

Which is to say,

Do you know the land where lemon trees blossom,
where golden oranges glow amid dark leaves …?

The words are by Goethe, that Italy-besotted German. I know this poem, not from poetry, but from song (the way I know most poetry). Many composers have set it, including Hugo Wolf, indelibly.

Hang on, why I am bringing this up? Oh, yeah: I’ve seen a grove of lemon trees …

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The general community of Maratea has a section called “Acquafredda,” meaning cold water. I bet it’s true, though I don’t test it (the water).

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A group of Italian tourists are talking with a hotel clerk—a clerk I have gotten to know a bit. They are talking animatedly, even agitatedly. Lots of gestures, a considerable commotion. I get about half their conversation, not all of it.

When these people have dispersed, I say to the clerk, “Let me ask you a funny question: Were those people mad or are they just Italian?” With a smile, she says, “They’re just Italian.”

They are from Lombardy, way up north.

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The next day, I speak with another clerk, who knows English well. I ask her why or how. She spent eight years in Bristol, is the answer. She worked at a pharmacy, and the manager was very sad when she and other employees from abroad had to leave.

Why did they have to leave? Brexit—complications of.

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For about 20 minutes, for reasons I could explain, I am in an awkward social situation with a drunk. Not a well-off fellow who has drunk too much. A down-and-outer, probably homeless.

I remember, so help me, something an acting teacher told her class long ago. When you play a drunk, don’t play a drunk. Play a person who is drunk and is trying to maintain his dignity. Who is trying to pass himself off as not drunk.

I also think of a famous passage from The Little Prince. I’ll go from memory: “I drink because I’m ashamed. I’m ashamed because I drink.”

A vicious, satanic cycle.

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My analogy will be strained, but worthwhile, I hope. People think of San Francisco as “northern California.” In truth, it’s a little bit more than halfway up. People think of Naples as the capital of southern Italy, and they’re quite right. But there is a lot of southern Italy south of Naples …

Today I am in Reggio Calabria, which is just about as far south as you can go (on the peninsula, not including Sicily). There’s a song by Rodgers & Hammerstein: “They’ve gone about as fur as they c’n go!”

If you think of the shape of Italy, Reggio Calabria is in the toe of the boot. It’s about 200 miles south of Naples.

Across the Strait of Messina is … well, Messina, on the northeastern tip of Sicily.

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A quick word about the subheading of this present part of my journal, Part XIV: “A turn in the South.” Do you recognize it? It is the title of a 1989 book by V. S. Naipaul (about the United States).

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Reggio Calabria boasts a fruit: bergamot, defined by one source as “a fragrant citrus fruit the size of an orange, with a yellow or green color similar to a lime, depending on ripeness.”

On grounds of “When in Rome …,” I try some bergamot ice cream.

I try it at Gelato Cesare, one of the most famous ice-cream parlors in Italy, a parlor sometimes rated No. 1 in the world of Italian ice cream, gelato.

The lines are out the door. The place closes at … 2 in the morning.

Here in the Deep South—certainly in Reggio Calabria—people like their ice cream stuffed into a brioche. No kidding.

I hit Gelato Cesare a couple of times. Is this ice cream good? Yes. Is it superior to ice cream elsewhere in the country? You know, not that I can tell (to be perfectly honest).

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Also on grounds of “When in Rome …,” I have me a bottle of bergamot soda. Distinctive.

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I see a sign on a gate: “NOEL.” Something having to do with Christmas? No, this is the acronym for the Natural Ocean Engineering Laboratory, which is part of the Università Mediterranea.

The lab’s name is in English. (A nice acronym results.)

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The hills are steep in Reggio Calabria, as in so many other Italian towns. These days, people get a little help from escalators. Have a look:

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Ah, our namesake. Or are we his? Anyway, I see Amerigo Vespucci Street.

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On posters, there are some municipal slogans: “Together, we can.” And, “A city that works, a city for all.”

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A local gives me a little speech, which is wise and helpful. Goes something like this:

Reggio Calabria and Messina are mirror cities. We are strait cities. We’re like each other. Reggio Calabria is not very Calabrian, and Messina is not very Sicilian. We’re our own thing.

Taormina [in Sicily] is for tourists. It is very beautiful, don’t get me wrong. But it does not feel very Sicilian or Italian. It is like a Disney exhibition. A very good Disney exhibition.

Catania is crazy and beautiful, like Milan. Palermo, too, is crazy and beautiful.

Syracuse is the city—the great Sicilian city, I would say. It is thoroughly Sicilian, endlessly interesting, and very beautiful. No one hassles you there. You go at your own pace. Syracuse is my favorite city in Europe, actually.

All of Sicily is to be absorbed. Many of the people there don’t speak Italian—they speak only Sicilian of one variety or another. And Sicily, of course, has known many, many problems over the years.

But the people have big, big hearts.

See you in Sicily, my friends. Thanks so much for joining me. Later on.

Dear readers: The previous parts of this journal can be found at the following links: I, II, III, IV, V, VI, VII, VIII, VIX, X, XI, XII.

Arriving in Naples and exiting the station, I feel something I haven’t felt in days: a breeze. Ah, the Bay of Naples! Not only beautiful, but also useful.

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Outside the station, there are military of some sort, young men with berets and sticks, swaggering. I think: “There’s a thin line between protectors and bully-boys.” An old, old story, in Italy and everywhere else.

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Walking through the city, I have a sense of being in a movie, set in Naples. Naples is a movie set. But I have to chuckle. “The movies look like Naples, Jay. It’s not that Naples looks like the movies.”

See what I mean? Let’s get horse and cart straight!

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All the clichés about Naples are true. Chaotic, unruly, colorful, free-wheeling, lush, talkative, exciting.

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Let’s talk about the traffic for a minute. It’s not that there are no rules. But the rules are like slang, rather than a formal language. Drivers know what they can do without hitting anyone or being hit.

At a crosswalk, drivers will let pedestrians pass. But they don’t want to stop moving. They will keep rolling, knowing how fast they can go without grazing you.

This is unnerving to the pedestrian—but only in his first hours in town. He gets used to it …

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If sidewalks are crowded, you may walk on the street for a bit. You know what I see? The driver of a van, wanting to pass walkers on the street, goes up over the curb onto the sidewalk for a bit.

Swear. I saw this with my own two eyes.

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***

Naples is grimy and even brutish, here and there. But suddenly—a relaxed splendor. Friendly beauty. “Vedi Napoli e poi muori,” goes the old saying. “See Naples and then die.” This saying was spread ’round the world by Goethe in his Italian Journey.

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There are grand plazas, open spaces—but mainly nooks and crannies. Many more byways than highways.

Go uphill with me for a sec:

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Funny thought, funny observation: There must not be many dryers in Naples. Clothes are hanging everywhere. (And air-dried is better than machine-dried, you may agree.)

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I wonder: Are any city’s songs better known throughout the world than those of Naples? “O sole mio.” “Torna a Surriento.” “ ’A vucchella.” “Funiculì funiculà.”

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Riccardo Muti champions the music of Giuseppe Martucci, a Neapolitan who lived from 1856 to 1909. In particular, he conducts Martucci’s Notturno, Op. 70, No. 1. As Muti says, you can see the moon over the Bay of Naples as you listen.

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Speaking of music, there is a street named after Scarlatti in this city. Which one? Not which street but which Scarlatti? Alessandro, the father, or Domenico, the son?

Alessandro. Via Alessandro Scarlatti.

He was born in 1660. His (more) illustrious son, also a composer, was born in 1685—same year as Bach and Handel.

That was a good year.

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***

Another street: Via Acton. Huh. Are the Neapolitans honoring our Acton, the great English liberal? No, this is Ferdinando Acton, a Neapolitan admiral and statesman. But guess what: he was a cousin of our Acton—who was born in Naples.

Well, I never …

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Have a view of the city (and beyond), from way up:

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Something blights the city—and other Italian cities, but especially this one, I think: graffiti. People have scrawled graffiti as if it were their job. Why this is permitted, and why it is not cleaned up, I don’t know.

These scrawlings are not artistic or charming or “authentic.” They are vandalism and defacement and uglification. To say it again, they blight Naples.

Let people scrawl on the walls inside their homes if they want …

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I like the sign on this school: “Don’t dirty it up. This school belongs to everyone.”

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Earlier in this journal, I said that I had seen something I had not seen when I was a student in Italy, 42 years ago: vegan ice cream. We did not know the word “vegan,” or at least I didn’t.

So it is with gluten-free pizza …

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Tomato sauce in Italy is … tomato sauce. What do I mean by that? The sauce is made of tomatoes, and little else. Back at home, our tomato sauce tends to be … what? Not all that tomato-y, frankly.

I could go on and be more specific, but I’m no Julia Child …

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A Neapolitan waiter tells me, “Spaghetti with tomato sauce is my comfort food. When I’ve had a bad day or am anxious or angry: I want nothing else.”

I understand.

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Toward the beginning of this journal, I commented on, and marveled at, the word “eh.” In Italy, it can have multiple meanings, uttered in multiple tones. To hear a little girl in Naples say “eh” is … enchanting.

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A boy of about 13 is jawin’ with his mates in raw Neapolitan, and, leaving them, he shouts over his shoulder, “Capì?” “Do you understand?”

As if from a movie …

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In this journal, I have mentioned, and shown, the Scala opera house in Milan and the opera house in Rome. Here in Naples, there is the fabled Real Teatro di San Carlo, the Royal Theater of Saint Charles.

Have a glimpse, through an archway:

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The hotel in which I’m staying forms part of a “complex,” let’s say. I would like to show you a little of the complex, for the sight is typically Neapolitan:

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The entrance to the courtyard is an old, old door. It must have been a grand, or at least a stately, door, once upon a time: a portone. (They still call it that: a portone.) The first time I go through it, I bump my head. I think anyone over 5-foot-7 or so would have to duck.

When the door was measured and made, how many had to duck? Very, very few, I bet.

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Do you like the color of this building? I do. I think it works well in this environment.

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The beggars here in Naples seem to be less … professional than the ones I encounter, every day, in New York. They also seem to be needier.

There are needy beggars in New York, to be sure. But mainly, I see the professional ones, who are well fed and well clothed. They show up for “work,” every day. Sometimes I see them in the morning, alighting from the subway, getting ready to put in their shift.

This happens day after day, week after week, year after year (literally).

One woman I see in Naples “sings for her supper.” She holds a sign saying that she is poor and she sings, lustily, soulfully.

I admire her. She is giving something.

This is a big, big subject, and I’m moving on …

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Another big subject: black Neapolitan kids, jiving with the other Neapolitan kids, in “raw Neapolitan,” as I have described it. (They are probably made to deal in standard Italian in school.)

Will it all work out, the immigration in Italy and elsewhere in Europe? Time is telling, day after day …

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You know what I see in Naples, which I find rather remarkable? Remarkable enough to remark on it here? Italian tourists. Lots of Italian tourists.

It’s kind of touching. (Why shouldn’t they too want to see Naples?)

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Man, do these people eat late and stay out late—men, women, boys, girls, families.

A quick photo:

Another one for the road:

Thanks so much for joining me today, you guys. Really appreciate it. Later on.