7 Days in Venice/Gianmaria Dona dalle Rose
I have now finished Gianmaria Dona’s guide to Venice.
Although it is just 133 pages this is something of a feat as it is written in Italian – an English translation is in course of being published.
Gianmaria is well-qualified to write such a guide as he is Venetian and his family one of ancestral lineage numbering several doges.
He himself had a distinguished career in publishing with the Rizzoli Group and after that a director of Fox Films.
On retirement he has written two books, one a biography of his forebear Leonardo Dona, a sponsor of Galileo, and now this guide.
It would be more accurate to describe his guide in the Latin words ‘vade mecum’ (“come with me”). Gianmaria uses the French word ‘une flanerie’, best described as a stroll.
So he strolls though the quarters (sestieri) of Venice he knows so well describing churches, telling stories of his family and recommending restaurants.
The latter is especially useful as Venice is no gastronomic centre and lays many tourist traps.
He knows the local trattoria.
Venice is one of the world’s spectacular cities.
It is the only city know where canals are the main ways and routes for getting about. Over the years it has attracted many famous travellers to it: Stravinsky, Wagner, JMM Turner, Ezra Pound, Lord Byron, Alma Mahler, Peggy Guggenheim – to name just a few.
Venice has produced painters Canaletto, Titian and Tintoretto, the comic playwright Goldoni – who wrote A Servant of Two Masters – and has the famous opera house – now restored after a fire – of La Fenice.
All of this Gianmaria evokes and describes beautifully with the love and enthusiasm of a local inhabitant as he now lives there.
Travelling has been nigh on impossible in the pandemic but his book not just gave me an inimitable appreciation of Venice but made a trip there to make some of the walks top of my wish list.
