| Title | : | Four Seasons in Rome: On Twins, Insomnia, and the Biggest Funeral in the History of the World |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 1416540016 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9781416540014 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Hardcover |
| Number of Pages | : | 210 |
| Publication | : | First published June 12, 2007 |
Four Seasons in Rome: On Twins, Insomnia, and the Biggest Funeral in the History of the World Reviews
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After finishing All the Light We Cannot See, I’ll confess I was a bit addicted to Doerr’s lovely writing. Since we were about to take a trip to Rome, I thought I would pick up this travelogue about Doerr’s year in Rome as a creative writing resident. He describes the city with love and nostalgia, capturing Rome at its funniest and most breathtaking. It’s difficult to say something new about a city that has captured imaginations for millennia, but Doerr manages to do so in this story of an Idaho couple with two toddlers who are thrust into Rome for a year. Again, this is a book you read for the writing. Doerr really knows how to craft a scene and turn a phrase.
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What a book ! Sensual, Captivating and beautifully written. Anthony Doerr finds himself in the heart of Rome shortly after his twin boys were born. Having received the Rome Prize, an award that gave him a year-long stipend and studio in Rome he embraces the adventure and moves his family to the Eternal City.
I loved so much about this book, the writing is poetic, lyrical and so vivid, the author's descriptions of Rome through the seasons are breathtaking. This is a short read at 205 pages but Doerr never wastes a word as we walk through the streets of Rome with him and his enviable stroller containing two delightful and demanding babies. We see life in a small apartment with his wife and children and how they try to adapt to the language and customs of a foreign city where life takes on a new meaning as well as challenges. I loved the snippets of history of Rome sprinkled throughout the book and I spent almost every chapter googling places and buildings and really enjoyed this eloquent and witty little book. His descriptions of people he met on the streets on a daily basis was so vivid and real. All in all a suprisingly uplifting and delightful read and a lovely little escape to a city full of life and history and intrigue. -
This is a lovely and enjoyable travelogue from an American writer who spent a year in Rome on a fellowship. I picked it up not just because I like travel memoirs, but also because I recently read Anthony Doerr's excellent novel All the Light We Cannot See, and he had been working on that book while he was in Rome back in 2004.
Doerr and his wife moved to Italy when their twins were newborns, so besides the travel vignettes and insightful comments from a writer talking about the process of writing, there are also adventures in parenting in a foreign country. Additionally, Pope John Paul II died while they were in Italy, and Doerr marveled at the millions who flocked to Rome for the pope's funeral.
In short, there's a lot of interesting stuff in this 200-page travelogue. Doerr is an engaging writer and I enjoyed following his journey. Recommended for those who like stories of Italy or books about writers and writing.
Favorite Quotes
"We came to Rome because we'd always regret it if we didn't, because every timidity eventually turns into regret."
"The only way to fall asleep is to stop trying to fall asleep. Sleep is a horizon: the harder you row toward it, the faster it recedes.
[on visiting the grave of John Keats]
"We are hemmed by brickwork, ivy, history. A line from a Tom Andrews poem comes back to me: 'The dead drag a grappling hook for the living. The hook is enormous.'"
"A good journal entry — like a good song, or sketch, or photograph — ought to break up the habitual and lift away the film that forms over the eye, the finger, the tongue, the heart. A good journal entry ought to be a love letter to the world."
"I agree to live now, live as sweetly as I can, to fill my clothes with wind and my eyes with lights, but I understand I'll have to leave in the end." -
[2.5] While reading Doerr's reminiscences of his family's year in Rome, I sometimes felt like a polite neighbor sitting through a bland, travelogue slideshow. Although well-penned, his observations lacked insight, depth or humor. Fortunately, it was short and easy to finish. I'll stick to his fiction from now on.
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I am surprised by how disappointed I was while listening to Doerr read this memoir which takes place over the course of a year in Rome. The only other book of Doerr's which I have read is
All the Light We Cannot See which I loved and is a favorite. I was looking to revisit Rome through Doerr's eyes and narrative, but I never felt fully engaged which always kills a book for me. Doerr kept me at a distance and pulled me out of his leapfrogging narrative with his constant (over)use of metaphor and other literary devices. His narrative voice sounded like he was reading poetry and not a travelogue/memoir. There are some beautiful passages and some of the metaphors are brilliant but they just kept coming. A case of too much of a good thing which pulled me/the narrative out of Rome and into his/my head. He dropped this style in a couple of places where flowery language would have been inappropriate and then the narrative was smooth and engaging.
I thoroughly enjoyed and was happily reminded of some of my own travel experiences in Italy and elsewhere when Doerr described the mouth-watering food and coffee, the lovely Italian people and the crazy Italian drivers, of shopping or trying to do anything in a foreign country when you do not know the language and customs. I also enjoyed his most frequent topic of discussion, his twin boys.
Many people loved this book, especially the prose and the metaphors, so I invite you to consider those reviews. -
On the day that his twin sons were born, Anthony Doerr received a letter informing him that he had won the Rome Prize. He was given a small apartment, a studio at the American Academy, and a monthly stipend to spend a year writing in the Eternal City. Six months later, he and his wife bundled up the twins and flew from Idaho to Italy.
Doerr writes about the challenges of parenting twins, especially the lack of sleep, and the love he feels for them. Communicating in Italian is another difficult task, sometimes with humorous results, and other times frightening as when he needed to get medical help for his wife Shauna. During the year the author read all 37 volumes of Pliny's "Natural History" (from AD 77) as well as many other works about Rome. His family walked and rode buses through the city with a twin stroller, marveling at the beauty they could find. The whole area of Rome and the Vatican is really a huge art museum. They were also witness to the events at Saint Peter's Square when the Pope died and another Pope was chosen.
Doerr is a keen observer of both people and nature. His lyrical writing is beautiful, and draws the reader in to experience Rome through his eyes. "Four Seasons in Rome" is an especially enjoyable travel memoir. -
Every morning I try to remind myself to give unreservedly, to pore over everything, to test each sentence for fractures in a dream.
-Anthony Doerr
I read this memoir because I want to travel to Rome someday. Yet people who know me or follow my reading habits also know how much of an Anthony Doerr fan I am: his story collection,
The Shell Collector, is one of my favorite story collections; his novel,
All the Light We Cannot See, was the first novel I reviewed this year and is a favorite read of 2020; plus his writing is an inspiration for anyone with writing aspirations. I love reading about personal experiences during travel and if there is anyone who knows how to shape a story in a supple way that a reader processes his world and imagines herself in it, that person has to be Doerr:
A good journal entry - like a good song, or sketch, or photograph - ought to break up the habitual and lift away the film that forms over the eye, the finger, the tongue, the heart. A good journal entry ought to be a love letter to the world.
Leave home, leave the country, leave the familiar. Only then can routine experience - buying bread, eating vegetables, even saying hello - become new all over again.
When Doerr is awarded the prestigious Rome prize (a one-year writing fellowship from the American Academy of Arts and Letters), he finds himself in Rome with his wife and twin boys. This memoir is one that illuminates the writing life, as Doerr works on his famous novel even while he deals with bouts of insomnia and some unsuccessful attempts at writing. What is compelling are those revelations of being new parents in a strange city, raising twin boys (babies), and not knowing the language or customs. There is something magical about the unknown that makes a writer lean on what he knows best, which in this case becomes gorgeous descriptions, nuanced storytelling, and attention to the kind of details that appeal to the senses. Rome, its beguiling architecture and archaic manner, is recreated in this book. -
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Doerr, who wrote, “All the Light We Cannot See”, wins an award to spend a year in Rome writing. His wife has just given birth to twins and their move is definitely an entertaining one.
Reading this book made me feel as if I was in Rome. His descriptions are beautiful and it was just lovely to imagine all the sights, sounds, and aromas. The book is sprinkled with wonderful moments throughout. Towards the end, however, I felt that it was becoming a bit aimless and it started to drag, but I enjoyed it overall.
Some of my favorite quotes:
“If it ever begins to snow, we should run to the Pantheon, because to see snowflakes come drifting through the hole at the top of the dome is to change your life forever.”
“To spend a day walking the streets in Rome, we’re told, is to inhale the equivalent of eighteen cigarettes.”
“The world is not a pageant: beauty is as unquantifiable as love. Geography is not something that can be ranked.”
“Roma, they say, non basta una vita. One life is not enough.”
“The only way to fall asleep is to stop trying to fall asleep. Sleep is a horizon: the harder you row toward it, the faster it recedes.” -
I have a love affair with Italy having had the great fortune to visit it two years in a row (2010 and 2011). Venice and Florence were easy falls/love at first sight, Rome not so much. Needless to say spectacular even the first time around (it is Rome after all!), it was much more rough and tumble -- requiring more from the tourist... a bit of work, having to earn it a bit (or a lot) more than the other two locales. But on the second time around, the city easily revealed its charm almost immediately. I knew my way around and was prepared and ready for the grit, the bustle, the attitude.
I was pretty prepared to hate, or at minimum, at least be pretty darn bitter about Anthony Doerr's Four Seasons in Rome. How could I possibly even like this guy who won a literary prize that awarded him a full year in the Eternal City with room, board, and a salary just to work on his craft?! But alas, Doerr defied the odds and right from the start I found myself not only *not* hating him but even liking him.
So while the "win a trip to Rome for a year" premise is still pretty annoying, I think what helped things out was that this was not one of those travel memoirs where the person is trying to "find themself." Not that there is anything wrong with that, was/am a big fan of the mother of that genre -- Liz Gilbert's Eat, Pray, Love -- but that's very "been-there, done-that" at this point, though any personal tale of travel and particularly living abroad is a life-changing/altering experience.
Rounding out the non-hate, was that he and his wife moved there with 6-month old twin boys. Being a childless person, that's enough of a personal nightmare for me anywhere in the world, let alone doing it halfway across the world where I don't speak the language. Finally what was particularly endearing, was that Doerr does not end up doing much productive writing as, no surprise, Rome and new fatherhood both end up being two pretty darn big distractions! I only became aware of this memoir having recently read Doerr's first novel, All The Light We Cannot See which appears to be what he fully and well-intended to work on while in Rome, but it appears that a short story and this book from his journal were the end-products of that year abroad.
I am giving the book an unofficial 4.5 stars, it really struck a chord with me and I relished most every moment of it -- tacking on my sheer/pure sentimentality/love for Italy and Rome, giving it the Goodreads bump up to 5 stars. Doerr is a helluva writer and beautiful captures the magic and spirit of this ancient city. His quite literary (but always accessible) prose might get a bit eye-rolly at times, particularly to the Rome uninitiated, but for me it is a city that deserves all the florid language and languishing descriptions. It certainly elicited audible sighs or side-smiles from this reader. -
This was SO thoroughly enjoyed. Not only for the "new eyes" to Rome but also for the total Doerr grab to what infancy care feels like for a parent. In this case first time parents and also for multiples, twins.
But believe me, when you have an endless screamer or have them in steps less than 18 months apart, there is little difference. I absolutely adored that closet room they rigged up in that tiny Rome apartment so the screamer could have his dark.
He also completely "gets" insomnia. The variety that sits life-long in some of us from earliest to latest days. People who have no tendency or periods of this which they surmount- they really have little idea. I loved how the more he'd try the farther the shore "got away". Oh YES!
But the flavor of the food and life with those babies which caused reaction in so many everyday Romans! He should have made more friends and had some continued conversations- and he DID realize that fact at the end.
His poor wife had it MUCH, MUCH harder than he did. I'd LOVE to hear her report in a like manner to this little book, about 7 or 8 months after their return home. SO many reasons, and hope she is well. -
This book gave me a lot of mixed feelings. I was looking forward to reading a book set in Italy, and of course reading about other people's sleep and parenting woes is one of my hobbies. Once I started reading, I was pleased at how well-written it was. And I think a special award should go to anyone who pens lines such as, "Trying to dress [the twins:] after a bath is like trying to put pajamas on a mackeral" or "This, I suppose, is what it means to look after two babies: any attempt to make you feel as if you were at the center of something is hopelessly hilarious."
As Pee Wee Herman, noted, though, everyone has a big BUT. This book was, for the most part, a collection of random, poetic impressions. Not only did that wear thin as a concept, but the whole wide-eyed wonder of the book seemed rather strained. I mean, it was written in 2007. Isn't the country bumpkin abroad in Italy a bit outdated? I was consumed with curiosity about the details of what Doerr's wife was doing all day, living in a country where she knows no one, doesn't speak the language, and is attempting to parent infant twins. All this was missing; instead we got way too many still lives of Roman bakeries and crowds and starlings.
And then there were lines like this: "A spring night is a power that sweeps through the crowded sheaves of blooming tulips and pours into your heart like a river." That line alone would knock a star off a review. -
A veces los libros te eligen a ti y no tu a ellos. Es lo que me ha ocurrido con esta pequeña joya de Anthony Doerr. Si no hubiera leído antes "la luz que no puedes ver" (que tras leer este libro tengo claro que no hubiera sido igual sin esta experiencia del escritor en roma)y casualidades de la vida me encontrara con este libro justo después de leer "spqr" de mary beard seguro que aunque hubiera aparecido en mi camino habría pasado de largo. El libro son las memorias del año que pasó el escritor viviendo en Roma gracias a una beca justo con sus hijos gemelos recién nacidos lo que hizo que su familia se embarcara en esta aventura. Me ha servido para ratificar lo buen narrador que en Doerr y ya me quedo con las ganas de seguir leyendo sus otros libros. Para los que vayan a visitar la ciudad eterna les recomiendo su lectura antes del viaje porque van a descubrir lugares de la ciudad por los que pasar y a los que ya hemos tenido la suerte de estar Doerr con su manera de unir las historias del imperio romano , con la roma renacentista y la vida de los actuales romanos consigue que nos den ganas de volver a pasear por sus calles.
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LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE LOVE this book!
The diction of the novel just feels so right and natural to me. Doerr is a true artist, knowing exactly how to blend a combination of words to make you stop and stare (and envy his talent). I read this book every time I want to get myself in a writing mood. His craft is undeniable. A must read for every writer that loves the sound of words and the compelling images it creates. -
After reading All the Light by this author which set the bar very high on expectations this book was a let down in many ways.
Possibly because this is not really a novel but a travel biography of sorts with a fairly good description of Rome ( a representation for this to be a historical novel ). The overarching image of this book for me will remain the babysitting time the author and wife spent with their lovely twin sons.
The book is a description of a year spent in Rome by the author and his family under a scholarship from the Academy of Arts. He attempts to write a book while taking care of his twin sons Henry and Owen with his wife Shauna.
The pay offs in this book are introductions to Pliny the Elder’s Natural History and some interesting anecdotes from its series and a number of “snapshots” of monuments in Rome as well as points of interest in this historic city.
I was not sure if this theme warranted a novel. -
The day his wife gave birth to twin boys, Doerr found out he won a fellowship he hadn't applied for: a year in Rome with all expenses paid so he can write. Six months later Anthony and Shauna, Henry and Owen, leave Boise and move to Rome. He lives in the same neighborhood Julius Caesar lived and sits in the garden where Galileo sat. Ponder that! The book he was preparing to write was All the Light We Cannot See. [Now that he's moved to Paris, I'm kicking myself for not driving a few hours to Boise for one of his readings.]
Doerr's book intersects with some of my highest interests: family, travel, the daily life of an author. It won 5 stars because of the wonder-infused writing, a blend of N.D. Wilson and Frances Mayes.
Quotes:
"Rome is a broken mirror, the falling strap of a dress, a puzzle of astonishing complexity. It is an iceberg floating below our terrace, all its ballasts hidden beneath the surface."
"I x-ray sentences, I claw away a paragraph and reshape it as carefully as I can, and test it again, and peer into the pages to see if things in there are any clearer, any more resolved. Often they are not. But to write a story is to inch backward and forward along a series of planks you are cantilevering out into the darkness, plank by plank, inch by inch, and the best you can hope is that each day you find yourself a little bit farther out over the abyss."
"I try to shape a few sentences around this tiny corner of Rome; I try to force my eye to slow down. A good journal entry—like a good song, or sketch, or photograph—ought to break up the habitual and lift away the film that forms over the eye, the finger, the tongue, the heart. A good journal entry ought be a love letter to the world."
“Without habit, the beauty of the world would overwhelm us. We’d pass out every time we saw— actually saw— a flower. Imagine if we only got to see a cumulonimbus cloud or Cassiopeia or a snowfall once a century: there’d be pandemonium in the streets. People would lie by the thousands in the fields on their backs.”
"In the States, practically every time someone would stop us on the street or in the grocery store, they'd gesture at the stroller and say, "Twins? Bet you have your hands full." They'd mean well, of course, but to be reminded of something you can't forget is debilitating. I prefer the Italian mothers who lean over the stroller and whisper, "So beautiful," the smiles of passing children, the old Roman who stopped us today and grinned at Henry and Owen before shaking my hand and saying, with a bow, "Compilmenti." My compliments." -
Anthony Doerr received a writing studio for one year in Rome as part of an award he won. WOW. So he packed up his newborn twins, his wife and spent four seasons in Rome. The man has a way with words whether he is writing fiction or nonfiction. He writes beautifully which is one of the reasons I loved his book "
All the Light We Cannot See". I enjoyed the descriptive quality of his writing and I enjoyed his passion, not only for his writing and his family, but for all of his surroundings. -
This was a great read - thank you Anthony Doerr for winning the award that gave you a year in Rome with your wife and babies! I definitely connected with this little memoir as I was totally soaking up the imagery and play by play in anticipation of being in Rome in about a month! I also related so well to the exhaustion of little baby boys! I loved the insight and pondering....how we view such "old world or "old history" in this modern digital society. And now I have a little bit better understanding of why and how it took you so long to write The light We Can Not See, you gave a few glimpses into how you were preparing to write it, very interesting! I also have a better insight into your writing - it is heavy on the imagery and description - I can see how that worked for me in this book and was a little harder for me in your other best selling fiction novel.
Readers definitely pick this up if you want to transport yourself into the daily life in Trastevere, the exhaustion of twin newborns, the Pantheon at Christmas, the dying and re-electing of the Pope and various other things that happen throughout the 4 seasons. -
I love Rome and this book reminded me why. There is a lot in here about the author's kids and his writing (it is a memoir), but it's all interesting.
I love his descriptions of Rome. One of my faves is (I think I'll get his right)--as he's describing all the contradictions and nuances of Rome, he uses the phrase..a metaphor along the lines of Rome being a dress strap that slipped off the shoulder. (obviously his wording is much more lovely). But, that's a great comparison for the City-- all at once careless but beautiful; sultry but innocent; compelling but negligent; simple but full of suggestion.
The book is short and so easy to read. I also loved his mentionings of his trips to Umbria--my absuolute favorite Italian province--home to Perugia and Assisi and Spoleto... -
After receiving the Rome Prize from the American Academy of Arts and Letters and with that prize a one-year, expense-paid opportunity to live and write in Rome, Anthony Doerr was off to Italy with his wife and their newborn twin sons. As a new parent, he confesses not to have made much headway with the novel he had hoped to work on during his time abroad, but we gained the gift of this unforgettable memoir, Four Seasons in Rome. It is a breathtaking book of mesmerizing observations and heartfelt musings on the indoctrination of parenthood during his time in one of the world’s most unfathomable cities. Doerr captures the splendor and spectacle that is Rome. Every page resonates with ecstatic beauty. The entire book feels like a lovely poem or an addictive song that plays in your head with the chorus of pure emotion. In offering up reflections on life, family, and the city, Doerr's prose fascinates with its gorgeous imagery. He makes your heart feel fuller with life and your mind bigger with wisdom. I found the book to be a rush of inspiration. Having read everything Doerr has published, I feel confident in saying he is a great American writer, among the best of his generation.
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I really loved this book. And I loved the author's writing style... Yes, it is full of metaphors and yes, it is super discriptive and yes, there is a lot of detail, and yes, I thought it was wonderful. I've read some reviews stating some readers thought Doer's writing was so beautiful in the beginning, but by the end they felt it was just too much and they were over it. I really don't know how anyone could get sick of something so beautiful. Plus, I think the author is aware that there is potential of this... Especially after reading this quote in the book ".... We began to feel glutted, oversaturated. Church interiors meld from one to the next, two-thousand-year-old columns float past unnoticed. Was that another Michelangelo? Another Pinturiccho? Fifty years ago, in Rome and a Villa, the novelist Eleanor Clark called it the "too-muchness" of Rome.......Too much beauty, too much input; if you aren't careful, you can overdose.". See, he knows that crossing the line is a potential, but he treats us anyways! I also loved that we know in this book he starts writing one of my favorite books "All the Light we Cannot See". I will definitely be reading more by this author. I would recommend listening to this audiobook as well, as it is narrated by the author: he did a great job.
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An engaging, warm and personal account by Anthony Doerr of his one-year experience living in Rome with his wife and twin boys – six months old at the time of his move. In poetic prose that vividly brings the city to life before your eyes and makes his experiences the reader’s experiences, Doerr relates what it’s like to supplant oneself from the familiar regularity of a Boise, Idaho life to the vibrant, historical, foreign and vita dolce of Rome, where navigating a stroller and the simple task of ordering a sandwich are confusing challenges. I loved Doerr’s beautiful descriptive writing, the ease with which his words flow -- bringing the reader intimately into his everyday life, his deep appreciation for Rome’s treasures and his entire embrace of living the experience during his four seasons in Rome. A wonderful read and highly recommended.
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I really enjoyed listening to this audiobook throughout my trip to Italy. What really fascinated me though was learning about the early stages of him writing All the Light We Cannot See. When he talks about struggling to research and write the first draft while taking care of babies and living in a foreign country and not getting any sleep, I just wanted to go back in time and tell him “You can do it! You will win the Pulitzer!” 😂
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The writing is excellent, which accounts for the 2 stars. The content sadly is hardly existing. In my eyes, the author felt compelled to add so many items and facts (and it feels like just name dropping) that any consistency is missing.
We hear about twins, the pope, abduction in Iraq, cooking, air pollution, Amsterdam, little towns in the US,... This gets all mixed with very isolated and often rather unimportant information about the history of Rome. -
What an absolutely beautiful, beautiful book. The writing was gorgeous and thoughtful, and the book as a whole is an exquisite love letter to Rome, one of my favorite cities in the world. I read this via audiobook (read by the author, and his narration was wonderful) and am definitely going to get a print copy as well so I can reread and linger over the beautiful sentences.
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Wonderful!
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I never thought I'd say this but after reading a few of those "expat" books on finding the perfect house in Tuscany and showing Italy in a way that is very cliche, I wasn't sure I'd like this book.
But Doerr won my heart with his prose! He can capture moments through his words. It felt like I was right there with him...he has weaved a few months in Rome so beautifully despite the twin struggles that I have to say I have fallen in love with Rome all over again! That being said, DO NOT EXPECT THIS to be A TRAVELOGUE because it's not. Read more here-
https://ishitasood.com/a-season-from-... -
An excellent, excellent little gem of a book. "Four Seasons" is Doerr's account of the year he and his wife spent in Rome with newborn twins. The city and all its wonders are brought to life on almost every page, with descriptive details and a wonderful use of language that made me feel as if I were there also. There are brilliant writers who dazzle you with the scope and audacity of their work; Doerr, for me, is a beautiful writer who brings a new way of looking at the everyday things in life, making you see them in a new way. I've read three of his works to date, and all have been 5 star reads. Highly recommended!
