We were milling with other tourists in the shaded cul-de-sac under the putative Juliet’s Balcony in Verona, replete with love locks, kissing couples, graffiti hearts pierced with Eros’ arrows, pledges of undying love, and twee trinkets as souvenirs. It was hot, humid and pressing. Even a little depressing.
“Do you think the star-crossed lovers would appreciate this throng or laugh at it?” I whispered into the ear of my own beloved.
“Mmm, interesting thought. Let’s get ourselves to a café, if not a nunnery, and think upon it,” she replied with a smile worthy of Mona Lisa, if not Ophelia.
Sipping a cappuccino, far from the madding crowd, I started in with a bit of counterfactual history. “What if Romeo and Juliet, who were not real anyway …what if they awoke today from their self-induced sleeps, like modern Rip Van Winkles? How different would Verona and environs appear to them, do you think?”
“Well, apart from the obvious of clothing and technology you mean?” My wife looked at me seriously over her amber-coloured aperitivo and said, “Couldn’t you picture Olivia Hussey or Claire Danes perched on that balcony? I loved those film versions of Romeo and Juliet.”
“I did too, but romance aside, their lives were tragic, hoisted on the petards of violent feuds, prejudice and discrimination, not to mention gender inequality. Maybe the heat has addled me, but I can’t help wondering if essentially the world would be that different for them.”
Perhaps to grant my mood some credence, she negotiated, “Well, why don’t we filter our holiday through that lens? A bit of Romeo and Juliet reflection to go along with pre-dinner drinks.”
We had chosen to holiday in northern Italy: first a rendezvous with British friends in Verona; then on our own, cycling in the Adige River valley; followed by a road trip along the Po River.
Verona is a lovely city, small as cities go, a pretty riverscape with numerous bridges, medieval towers and peeling bells, Roman antiquities and shaded cobbled streets that open to sunlit piazzas and faded wall murals. Our British friends had met us there, after a two-year hiatus, so we walked and chatted incessantly. At dinner, I tabled my hypothesis of plus ça change, plus la même chose [what goes around comes around].
My friend remonstrated. “You know Romeo and Juliet were fictitious, and what you’re observing about progress is just human nature at work. I know it’s one of the most popular and most produced of Shakespeare’s plays, but it’s romance, not fact.”
“No wait. It’s the symbolism and timelessness of it. There isn’t a lot of love in the world, you have to admit, and that young couple would see far worse violence today, don’t you think? What’s changed in the world? The Capulets and Montagues were a small spat compared to other feuds that still continue. Look how your Brexit vote split the country, not just towns or families. Would you exile anyone to achieve peace, as the Prince of Verona did?”
Sensing I had thrown the cat among the pigeons, my wife put her hand on my arm and whispered, “Not politics or religion, please. And yes, you may refill our glasses.”
My friend raised a conciliatory glass, “To us.” I muttered sotto voce, “To Romeo and Juliet’s woe everywhere.”
We sheathed the topic until we were travelling alone. The Adige River half encircles Verona and we meant to follow it northward by train and then cycle down the upper reaches of its tributary from the Alps, the Isarco, or Eisack in German. Our stop was not far from the Austrian border, and place names were in two languages. We got off at Bressanone, puzzled by the name Brixen at the station. “Do you think we got off at a suburb?” I asked, only to be told by the taxi driver that Brixen is the German name.
Our 17th century hotel sat along the riverbank, flower boxes adorned and rushing stream gurgling. It was a sensory pleasure. The hotel arranged a taxi to get our bikes.
“A Brunico, per favore,” I confidently ordered, only to be corrected. “You mean Bruneck.”
“Where are you going after here?” the concierge asked.
“Bolzano.”
“You mean Bozen.” And so it went in the isolated river valleys of the Dolomites.
A habit of ours is to read literature connected to the area we are visiting. We do our prior research but were unprepared for the fractious focus that our Romeo and Juliet lens would put on this holiday. Shakespeare was part of that, as well as Hemingway’s A Farewell To Arms, set in WWI and the Italian/Austrian front. Throw in the WWII atrocities and there was ample proof of nations set against each other, let alone “two households, both alike in dignity.” One source, in particular, clarified so much (Eva Sleeps by Francesca Milandri, a historical fiction/family saga covering 75 years from 1920).
We had ventured into the two solitudes of Alto Adige (Italian)/Südtirol (German). The region was ceded to Italy as part of the WWI settlement and underwent Italianization as pre- and post-WWII political strategies. The language and cultural tensions that ensued reminded us of separatist movements in our time. It explained why we didn’t see Italian flags, only the Südtirol white and red pennant more akin to the Austrian flag, until we reached the city of Trento.
Trento, the city of compromise and reconciliation, where the Catholic Church held three sessions over 20 years in the 16th century to deal with its own Reformation challenges. Trento was our last cycling destination; our hotel near the Piazza del Duomo, where we stopped to have a cappuccino and prosecco. We scanned the elegant amblers, arm-in-arm managing cobblestones in their high heels as if on a catwalk.
My wife said, “I think Romeo and Juliet would have enjoyed the cycling, the prosperity of their country, hiking the mountains. It would have been a marvel to them, and romantic, don’t you think?”
I replied, “And they probably would have settled right here. Look at the peace here.” Then I espied a huge banner above us commemorating Cesare Battisti, an irredentist patriot killed in 1916. “Look, we’re outside the house of a man executed by the Austrians for wanting Italian territory returned. Egad.”
The next day, we were confronted with more paradoxes and hypocrisies that our tragic couple would have recognized. While walking to the Castello del Buonoconsiglio, site of the Council of Trent, we passed a giant wall etching of a Fascisti centurion with rifle facing a park statue dedicated to the post-war prime minister, the rebuilder De Gaspari who led eight coalition governments, no mean feat of tact and tolerance. There was also some wall graffiti, saying “Leave Italy, Leave Rome.” And the castle itself was the site of a lengthy Renaissance conflict. Sure, there were beautiful wall paintings in the castello’s conciliatory meeting rooms, but they contrasted the small unadorned basement cell of Battisti, not unlike those of Irish “martyrs” of the Easter Uprising.
And later we happened upon a cemetery by the River Adige, a quiet and cool refuge we had sought until we saw a stark statue of father, mother and child atop barbed wire, commemorating Alto Adige feuding from the 1930s to 1960s. It was difficult to stave off a feeling of misanthropy.
Would the Po Valley, specifically Mantua, the city of Romeo’s exile, offer some respite? It was a lovely city bound by two lakes and shady nooks, which offered a break from the shimmering heat. Vergil, The Roman epic poet of the Aeneid, of the doomed love of Aeneas and Dido, was born here; Verdi’s Rigoletto, the opera of revenge and lost love was set here; and Romeo heard of Juliet’s “death” here.
We took advantage of a gallery display about Fate and Destiny in the ducal palace, cool and contemplative. Two paintings spoke to our musings on the tragic couple: one of two elderly spouses napping but having the same dream of their young love on a balcony (Morbelli, 1905); and a mother and child waiting on a hard bench in a spare room for their returning “hero” who is actually laying in a coffin (Bresciani, 1920). Alas!
Returning cross-country to our farm holiday digs, we sipped some local wine poolside under the pergola. I felt the need for a positive twist.
My wife said, “You know Romeo and Juliet would still see a lot of suffering today, but it shouldn’t blight us to the better angels of our nature.”
“Agreed. Maybe Romeo and Juliet were like an eclipse on this holiday and we’re seeing the light again. Certainly, vino is preferable to belladonna. Here’s to appreciating the beauty and goodness life has to offer but remembering also those who suffer. Such is fato e destino. And let’s pledge to not thwart love.”
We clinked a salute to Romeo and Juliet’s plight.
IF YOU GO:
Inntravel, the Slow Holiday People, www.inntravel.co.uk/cycling-holidays/italy/alps/orchards-vineyards
Agriturismo, Volta Montavana, Le Vigne di Adamo, www.levignediadamo.it/agriturismo/index.php?lang=it
Hotels in South Tyrol, Hotel in Bressanone, Goldener Adler, www.goldener-adler.com/en/goldener-adler.html
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