If it is a fact that in Naples everything is for sale, how much more true must this be in Poggio Reale? - Norman Lewis

A year among the Italians had converted me to such an admiration for their humanity and culture that I realise that were I given the chance to be born again and to choose the place of my birth, Italy would be the country of my choice.

The Italians of the South live, just as Africans do, on bread dipped in olive oil.

A problem has arisen. Although I handed in my army rations to the cook, with the intention of living on these, nobody has taken me seriously, nor believed that any human being in his right mind and able to eat pasta would refrain from doing so.