“THERE IS TOO MUCH WORK in too short a time,” Giuseppe said. “And not enough money The Calabresi won’t commit. They don’t think ahead. When you try to sell postcards early in the year, they say it’s too early. Then in June or July, when you come by again, they say it’s too late. They want everything at that moment.”We were strolling the promontory of the Tyrrhenian seaside village of Pizzo. Giuseppe wanted to take me around the Tyrrhenian Sea, from Pizzo down to Tropea. He was frustrated with business and the Calabrese way of conducting it.
“Ah, Calabria.” Giuseppe sighed.
“What about Calabria?”
“It will grow, but slowly. It will never attract the tourists like the rest of Italy,” Giuseppe said.
How lucky, I thought selfishly
“What about living someplace else?” I asked Giuseppe.
“If I could make a living that I liked, I’d leave tomorrow,” he said.
“And you wouldn’t miss Calabria?”
“Of course I’d miss it. But there’s sentiment, and there’s work.”
The piazza of Pizzo, which juts out into the sea, with the castle to the south, was packed with cars. The market had opened early that morning. What few fishermen there were these days had brought their catch. Teenagers, half hanging on their motorbikes and against the tufa wall of the promontory, cuddled and made out, oblivious to us. Cafes and restaurants lined the piazza, with outdoor tables covered by red-and-blue umbrellas. Pizzo is now known for its gelato more than for its fishing industry. Even the local Nostromo tuna-canning factory had been bought and moved to Spain, where labor was cheaper. Cement factories had been moved to the outskirts of town. The road to the factories, Giuseppe explained, is lined with fields of cipolle, sweet onions. Again, not even industry is far from nature in Calabria.
When I was in high school, my grandparents came to visit us in Florida for the first time in years; we usually visited them in Connecticut. We lived close to a golf course, at which my grandfather shook his head as if disappointed with the wasted use of land. But he nodded approvingly at my father’s garden, planted with Florida’s tropical climate in mind.
“Pa, look at these, Pa,” my father said, pointing to the largest tree in the backyard. “Bananas, Pa. And over there, I’m growing oranges and lemons.” They walked onto the pool patio. “And down here, Pa,” my father said, “are pineapples.”
My grandfather stopped. “Giusepp’, dove i pomodori?” Where are the tomatoes?
My father tried to explain that the roadside stands sold beautiful red tomatoes. My grandfather stood in silence, then out of his pocket he brought a plastic bag full of his own tomato seeds.
Two days later, when my father got home from work, he looked out the kitchen window to see that part of the backyard had been transformed. Sticks—strangely straight sticks—poked out of the tilled earth at regular intervals. At about that moment the phone rang. The next-door neighbor was calling to say that he had seen my
grandfather walking along the golf course, pulling up all the flags, and snapping them across his knee.
From that point on, my father grew tomatoes.
Pizzo’s piazza overlooks a Norman castle built in 1486 by Ferdinand I of Aragon.
During the brief time that Napoleon ruled southern Italy, he placed his brother-in-law Joachim Murat in charge of the region. Murat, an otherwise ineffective ruler, established strict laws against treason, which became punishable by death.
Gay Talese beautifully captures the end of Murat’s reign in Unto the Sons. While Napoleon focused on Waterloo, the Bourbons, with the aid of the English, had taken back the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. Murat, who believed the people of Calabria were enamored of him, sailed from Corsica to Calabria to begin a campaign to reclaim his throne, which had been taken by the Spanish. Murat left his ship on rowboats and rowed to the sandy shore. With a small coterie of soldiers, Murat marched up to the city, ostentatiously waving his hat as his gold spurs sparkled and jangled with every step.
A crowd began to form around him. He felt as if all of Calabria were backing him. Soon more people joined in. A padrone who had once served under him appeared before Murat and asked, “Who are you?”
“You know who I am.” Murat laughed.
“I do not,” said the man.
“I am Murat, your king.”
“You are not our king. Ferdinand is our king,” said the man.
The villagers jeered Murat and, with sticks and tuna spears, closed in on him. He and his soldiers broke away from the mob and ran for the shore with the villagers at their heels. The soldiers filled the boats and set off. As Murat tried to jump in his boat, legend has it, one of his flashy gold spurs got caught in a net. He tried to rip free, but the villagers grabbed him. Those who witnessed the attack talked of how violently the mob treated him. They ripped his hair
from his scalp as easily as they tore the clothes from his body. They spat all over him.
Two days later, inside the castle, the people of Pizzo tried Murat for treason under his own law and placed him in front of a firing squad. His last request was that the squad aim at his heart and spare his face. He refused to be blindfolded. His body, with an unmarred face, was sent to his wife, Napoleon’s sister Caroline.
In Pizzo there is a saying: “Gioacchinu a fattu a legge, Gioacchinu a patiu.” Joachim made the law, and Joachim died by the law
From Pizzo, Giuseppe took me to a place just north on the Tyrrhenian coast. Many areas on this coast resemble the Amalfi coast, with villages perched on cliffs—but over clear blue water that washes small spits of white sand, rather than sheer cliffs with stony beaches. Fifty to a hundred feet from shore, rocks thrust out of the blue like the backs of ancient dragons. Some have caves into which one can row a boat. Inside, the bright blue water shimmers from below, like the famous Grotta Azzura of Capri.
Legend has it that in the 1700s a ship crashed against some outlying rocks and sank, leaving the sailors to swim to shore. The sun was beginning to set when they finally washed upon the sandy beach. They looked up at the rocky cliffs, wondering where they were. About a quarter of the way up the sun illuminated the inside of a cave and a barely noticeable path leading up to it.
When they reached the cave, the sailors carved sculptures there as an offering of thanks for their safety. The statues in what is now called the Chiesa di Piedigrotta were formed from tufa and chalk. The statues of varying sizes, from lifesize to miniature, depict biblical stories. They blend with the stalagmites. The back wall drips with water. A few feet in front of the wall, an altar is centered between two stalactites. Candles burn on crisp white cloths. A painting of the lactating Madonna, the same as in Gimigliano, hangs on the moist wall above the altar.
Sculptures have been added throughout the centuries by local
artists. In one corner, the cave floor curves upward to meet the cave ceiling. On this slope, figurines of eighteenth-century peasants, each about six inches tall, roam the terrain. Tucked into a crevice, a life-size sculpted Madonna is surrounded by fresh carnations and roses. A little stone girl wearing a peasant robe kneels at the Virgin’s feet.
Giuseppe took a deep breath and whispered to me from the entrance. “Marco, do you remember the postcard I gave you of this?” he asked.
I did. I recalled how crisp the image on the postcard was, how much grander the sculptures looked in the photo than in person.
“I waited all day here. I paced around the entire cave, looking for the right angle. When the sun set over the water, I thought I’d get the best shot. But it still wasn’t good. Then as I was walking out of the cave, just after the sun had set, I turned to see the place light up.” Giuseppe brushed his forearm across his brow as if he were wiping away sweat. “I had my picture.”