For nine years, from 1949 to 1957 W H Auden spent the summer months on Ischia, a small volcanic island in the Bay of Naples. Soon after he and his partner Chester Kallman moved and made Austria their permanent home he wrote a valedictory peaen to their time in Italy - 'Goodbye to the Mezzogiorno'.
It's far from being one his best, think - 'The Shield of Achilles', In Praise of Limestone' or 'Bucolics' each must rank amongst the greatest poems written in English in the Twentieth Century. Compared to these 'Goodbye to the Mezzogiorno' is a light piece, but funny and engaging. It nails both the allure of the 'South' to buttoned-up northerners and the absurdities of their assumptions about the place.
The poem concludes: "though one cannot always Remember exactly why one has been happy, There is no forgetting that one was."
And it's true, for some reason it is really difficult to feel sad in Italy.
WeYesterday we moved from Alghero to a sosta in Porto San Paolo, back to the first place we stayed in when we arrived. It's only a few miles south of Olbia, convenient for the return crossing to Livorno that we have to catch in three days time.
We have good reason to feel miserable, not only does this represent our personal 'goodbye to the mezzogiorno' but annoyingly we've both succumbed to a fluey virus. Even though I'm feeling somewhat wiped out, unable to do the things we'd planned such as explore the nearby beaches on our bikes or have a final swim in the Med, I don't feel miserable, like I would at home. It's the Italiano effect!
Even if you feel dreadful there is no point in doing nothing. I didn't feel up to cycling and anything faster than a stroll seemed too much effort. We dialled down our expectations and took a slow 15 minute walk down to yet another positively reviewed gelateria. It has become an almost daily ritual.
Now we can attest to gelato's efficacy as an underappreciated tonic when suffering from a cold virus.
By the following day we had perked up a bit and managed to cycled to a nearby marina. In the summer Porto di Porto San Paolo is probably busy and vibrant as it's the departure point for day trips to the spectacular mountainous islet of Tavolara just across the bay. The small passenger ferry was still running but there were only a handful of people queuing up.
We wondered about having lunch out, but most places were closed up. Definitely an end of season vibe. The nearby fish restaurant was open but it was quite expensive, somewhere you would go for a nice lunch out not a delicious snack. Other than there was nothing, not even somewhere to have a coffee. We decided to head back to the van.
We are booked on tomorrow's overnight ferry back to Livorno. However we have to vacate the sosta by 11am which means we have the afternoon and early evening to wile away before we need to head for Olbia docks.
Porto Taverna, where we camped for a few days when we arrived in Sardinia a little over three weeks ago, is only about five kilometres south of here. The campsite is closed now but there's a big beach parking near by. We decided to head there.
The light was stunning. In the heat of the summer it can be a tad hazy, but in autumn the Mezzogiorno assumes a depth and intensity that is scarcely believable, like CGI for real.
Three weeks ago by mid-afternoon temperature on the beach reached the high twenties - lazing about weather. Today its about five degrees cooler. There are wooden walkways around the nearby lagoons and marshes, previously we never got to explore them, it was just too hot.
Today was perfect, warm but crystal clear, things in the distance - razor sharp and the colours vivid.
Details- textures and patterns - the crinkly fissures of rocky Tavolara in the distance, close by, vivid green algae, like an alien frog spawn in the mirror still lagoon.
Bernard Berenson's notion of the 'tactile imagination' sprung to mind - it must be well over half a century since I studiously made notes from a dog eared copy of his classic 'Italian Painters of the Renaissance' that I came across in the school library. However some phrases mysteriously lodge in your brain. Chatgpt defines 'tactile imagination' as 'a painter’s ability to evoke in the viewer a sense of touch or physical presence—the feeling that the depicted forms have real, tangible volume and exist in three-dimensional space'. The idea asserts that the more textural something is the more real it feels and the more profoundly we respond to it. We are literally as well as figuratively
The intensity of the light, the depth of colour and the way textures and patterns sing out makes the landscape of the Mezzogiorno feel immersive, addictive almost; as Auden asserted, 'surfaces need not be superficial'.
So no wonder saying goodbye is so difficult, but 'go we must'. Come mid-afternoon we headed for the docks via a quick grocery shop in Lidl, afterwards parking in an area reserved for motorhomes about a kilometre from the Grimaldi terminal.
Sadly it is goodbye. I wondered if Sardinia actually counted as the part of the Mezzogiorno. Google said yes - Italy south of Campania, Sicily and Sardinia are all regarded as 'the south' so far as EU structural funds and economic development is concerned. So in terms of economics and geography they all are treated the same.
Culturally, however, there are differences. The exuberant somewhat madcap behaviour that Auden celebrates in his poem is certainly the norm in Naples or Palermo, but less noticeable in Sardinia. If there is such a thing as an Italian introvert perhaps you might chance upon one here.
As darkness fell we headed for the terminal. Loading was less chaotic than on the outward leg, but because of the number of trucks it took ages. An HGV jam is not surprising when you consider the vast majority of the goods bought by Sardinia's one and a half million inhabitants arrive on the island on the back of a lorry. We departed eventually, about forty minutes late.
We had a beer and a snacky supper in the bar then settled down in the cabin. Somewhat spartan but serviceable.
It was just after dawn, around 7.30 am when we drove into the Livorno rush hour. The sky was overcast, threatening thundery showers later. It looked like late autumn. Most deciduous trees were still bright yellow, but the topmost branches bare. We may be 900 miles south of the Pennines but Tuscany felt distinctly northern.