Moksha World

I visited Palermo many years ago on my first solo trip outside the United States. I spent two weeks in Tuscany at a language camp and then a few days each in Rome and Palermo. I have not been back to Palermo since that visit but it has always been on my mind. I remember sitting on the plane as it prepared to take off and feeling intensely sad about leaving that city. I remember the beaches, the mountains, hearing people speak the Sicilian dialect, and having gelato in a brioche (amazing!).

I saw the 1963 Il Gattopardo movie based on the novel by Giuseppe Tomasi di Lampedusa when I was a teenager because my mother wanted to watch it. At the time, I had never heard much in school about Italy’s history so the movie held little significance for me. I certainly knew nothing about the movement to unify the regions into an Italian state. Later, when I studied Italian, the textbook mentioned Italy’s unification and the Italian language’s standardization.

Netflix announced a new limited series based on the novel a few months ago. I was interested but unsure if it would be good. I have enjoyed some Italian series, Il Commissario Montalbano and Gomorrah, for instance, but many have not had the complexity to appeal to me. This series was appealing in many ways. It combined the history with more context by connecting it to this family. I identified with the characters who were dealing with normal family issues as well as massive changes in their society. This series has given me new thoughts about how I have dealt with some of the changes in the recent past in my own family and how the Covid pandemic changed so many things for all of us. I related to the feeling of uncertainty about the future.

Many series have been produced about movements for equality and dissatisfaction with the structure of society. The head of the family, “Il Gattopardo”, is a formidable figure. Aristocratic for sure. But also a man who loves his family and wants to protect them. His behavior at times shows why people dislike the aristocracy. At other times he also shows compassion and self-reflection, especially later in his life. I appreciated how the story developed along both lines, never focusing only on his good or bad characteristics. It was a glimpse into his way of life and not a presentation of a preconceived judgment against the aristocracy.

The history of Sicily is quite diverse. Much more so than I had realized. It is part of Italy, yet not completely Italian. My desire to return and explore the island again has been reawakened. And now, I know more about Garibaldi than simply that there is a statue of him in Buenos Aires.