Monterosso, American English, Summerween, Ice Cream, Brit-Pop & More: Endnotes 03 July

Every Friday, we celebrate the weekend — and all the reading and relaxing and daydreaming time ahead — with Melissa's favorite book- and travel-related links of the week. Why work when you can read fun stuff?!

This post is part of our Endnotes series.

Those iconic striped beach umbrellas above are a summery symbol of Monterosso, the largest of the five coastal villages in Italy’s Cinque Terre. The picturesque town is known for its beaches, yes, but also its poets, lemons, and anchovies. Let’s take those one at a time! The poet? Eugenio Montale (1896-1981). As a young man, he trained to be an opera singer, then WWI intervened; after his voice teacher’s death in 1923, Montale turned his attention to poetry. In 1975, he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Literature. He was born in Genoa, but spent his first 30 summers in Monterosso. His family lived in a yellow Art Nouveau villa — the nearby cliffs, sea, and lemon groves inspired his first poetry collection Ossi di seppia (Cuttlefish Bones). He even wrote a poetic tribute to the town’s lemons: The Lemon Trees. Should you visit the town, you can explore his favorite places. (Read more of his poems.) The Monterosso lemon has been grown in Cinque Terre since the 17th century (and there’s a festival in its honor each May). The lemon is a bumpy-looking thing, the result of a cross between a pomelo and a citron. Its rough skin is rich in essential oils; its inside has a spongy white lining around juicy yellow flesh. Its juice is used in local specialties including limoncino (lemon liqueur), granita, lemon cake, and anchovies. Which brings us to that tiny, silvery fish. Every September, you can attend an Anchovy Festival to try them fried, salted, baked, or marinated, along with a nice cool glass of local white wine. In case you can’t get there just now, here’s a video stroll through town. Cin cin!

• I grew up near(ish) Amish country, and our next-door neighbors, Elaine and Marvin, spoke Pennsylvania Dutch. This article explores the knot of feelings around preserving a fading language. ‘A thousand times my cousins and I have spoken about our language derogatively, to each other or to non-Amish people, saying, it’s just a mix of English and German or it’s wrong German. We believed that over the past few hundred years we had disfigured what was originally correct.’

• Sorta related: Will American Ever Be a Fully Distinct Language of Its Own? ‘Webster’s dictionary, and his earlier attempts at spelling reform, expressed a radical desire to forge an entirely new tongue based in the vernacular genius of the aspiring American people.’

• George Forster was one of the great explorers in history, but ‘the slender pony-tailed adventurer whose travels and achievements once captivated monarchs, poets and scientists’ has now been largely forgotten.In her new book The Traveler, Andrea Wulf is trying to change all that in an entertaining fashion. I heard the author in this excellent podcast interview. This National Geographic essay has more.

• Happy Summerween to those who celebrate! Here are five lauded horror books from the Bram Stoker Awards — and this:

• If you like your ice cream with a side of style, here are five ice cream parlours with mouth-watering design. One of them is in Prague! We will do our due diligence and report back.

• For some off-the-beaten-path European destinations: 12 Under-the-Radar Italian Towns You Need to Visit and The Most Underrated Cities in Europe.

• If you only read one thing this week, make it this delightful essay — ‘an argument for small, thoughtful, slightly odd gifts.’ (I say that as a person who doesn’t love giving or receiving gifts. This essay has softened my no-gifts stance.)

• 7 Iconic Songs and Albums That Took Their Names From British Countryside Places. ‘… the British landscape has long served as a muse for musicians,’ including Peter Gabriel, Paul McCartney, Kate Bush, Brian Eno, and more.

• This is one of the dreamiest book-centric houses I’ve ever seen.

• I love these two poems by Alison Lubar. They go down easy but are packed with delicious words to chew on. Treat yourself.

• Merriam-Webster Quiz: Little Words, Big Vocabulary. I got 16/18.

May a lemon-yellow sun (gently) shine on you.

Top image courtesy of Sara Canonici/Unsplash+.