Under a Lion Sun: Days of Joy and Sorrow in Old Calabria

Join the author on a journey back through time to his beloved town in Calabria, in Southern Italy. Accompany him through a mental journey to the fifties and the sixties, as he was growing up in a location which could be blissful and, occasionally, violent. In this book you will meet many very loving people whose whole existence was self-sacrifice, and a few others who had no conscience and did the unthinkable without a hint of guilt. The author will also dissect and expose beliefs, customs and traits which both ennoble and limit a very energetic and intelligent people. This book is especially of interest to people whose roots are in Calabria, Italy. Anyone whose interest is anthropology will find this work very enlightening as well.

"...the book's overall feeling and content...is filled with love, intelligence and lots of mainly positive memories." (Italophile Book Reviews)


5.0 out of 5 stars
By Italophile Book Reviews on May 2, 2016

An Italo-Canadian recalls his life in Calabria before his family emigrated to Canada. His advanced education in Canada, along with several return visits to his family's home town of Capistrano, have given him a perspective that is rich with insights about Calabria of the past and present.

I believe that Indie publishing really comes into its own with these sorts of accounts, so I'm more than willing to overlook the handful of typos that come with them (hopefully they will be weeded out soon in this quality book).

The description of the book is overly negative, in my opinion. Most of the author's recollections are positive. Like every life, there are bad remembrances too, but not much that is out of character for a small agricultural community in the 50s and 60s, in an area with depleted soil and a baking sun. They were not wealthy, but:

"simple joys made life in Calabria worth living"

The author covers the area's traditions and way of life in great detail, including the food, festivals and superstitions. He also presents vignettes of local bigwigs, interesting people, and his family members.

Like all emigrants to other lands, his remembrances of food and tastes are the strongest, and luckily they can be renewed in visits to Italy, and even in some delicatessens in Canada.

The overly negative description is deceptive. Agricultural societies in the 50s and 60s in Calabria and Canada suffered from rural accidents, violent quarrels, preventable deaths, and untreated mental illness.

The unique elements in Calabria were the criminal sociopaths who thrived in an area with weak governmental institutions compounded by a passive fate-believing populace, and the lack of jobs that encouraged friends to help friends to jobs while excluding talented people from the workforce, and the paternalism that excluded women from societal decision-making and jobs. Those three elements continue to hamper economic development in Calabria, where the author admits:

"the civil rules of life do not always apply"