Chasing the Rose: An Adventure in the Venetian Countryside

Guest Review of “Chasing the Rose,” by Andrea Di Robilant

By John Casey

John Casey was born in 1939 in Worcester, Massachusetts, and educated at Harvard College, Harvard Law School, and the University of Iowa. His previous novel, Spartina, won the 1989 National Book Award for fiction. He lives in Charlottesville, Virginia, where he is Henry Hoyns Professor in the English Department at the University of Virginia. He is literary executor of the estate of Breece D'J Pancake.

In his quest for the genealogy of his rose, Andrea di Robilant deploys his gift for engaging with people. He shares this gift with the author of another of my favorite books, Akenfield by Ronald Blythe, an English poet who wandered around his county gathering the stories of gardeners, teachers, cooks, war veterans, lords and ladies. Andrea di Robilant has written something just as wonderful. He is fluent in at least three languages and has an amazingly detailed knowledge of history (Napoleon and Josephine play a part), but it is Andrea's enthusiasm and alert open-heartedness that make Chasing the Rose as full of incidents and personages as the most engaging novel.”