Black August
“They walked up Strada Nuova, which was coming alive after the long midday break. There were workmen with pneumatic drills who were digging a narrow trench into the soft ground beneath the street.
“The ENEL are laying electric cables,” Boatti said. He gestured. “And now our Communist/Conservative coalition are putting down stone slabs where for a hundred years there used to be cobbles.”
Most of the pedestrians were tourists, visitors from elsewhere, who ate large ice creams and, ignoring... the noise of the workmen, carefully studied the window displays in the city center even though most shops had already closed in anticipation of the Ferragosto.
The two men had to step over a rope before turning into via Cardano. They came into Piazza del Duomo. It was free of traffic.
It no longer seemed the same place—different light, different expectations—since the Torre Civica had gone. The debris had been removed and apart from the remaining pathetic stump beside the Duomo, the warning flags and the barriers, there was little to remind the casual passer-by of a monument that had weathered more than eight hundred winters of the Po valley.MoreLess
“The ENEL are laying electric cables,” Boatti said. He gestured. “And now our Communist/Conservative coalition are putting down stone slabs where for a hundred years there used to be cobbles.”
Most of the pedestrians were tourists, visitors from elsewhere, who ate large ice creams and, ignoring... the noise of the workmen, carefully studied the window displays in the city center even though most shops had already closed in anticipation of the Ferragosto.
The two men had to step over a rope before turning into via Cardano. They came into Piazza del Duomo. It was free of traffic.
It no longer seemed the same place—different light, different expectations—since the Torre Civica had gone. The debris had been removed and apart from the remaining pathetic stump beside the Duomo, the warning flags and the barriers, there was little to remind the casual passer-by of a monument that had weathered more than eight hundred winters of the Po valley.MoreLess
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