Without being explicitly stated, Miramar is a book about the Riviera Romagnola. We learn this from the quote in the epigraph: a tercet from Canto V of the Inferno, spoken by Francesca da Rimini. The “Marina” Dante speaks of is the Adriatic Sea, which recurs throughout these pages like a Wagnerian theme.

The imagery of the Riviera is linked to fun, hospitality, and good food. Colorful visions of pulsating disco lights, multicolored beach umbrellas and deckchairs, the red of prosciutto and Sangiovese, the green of arugula, and the white of squacquerone from the millions of piadinas served to locals and tourists. Carefree, a zest for life, and lightheartedness. These are clichés that, as such, find their roots in reality. However, what we see in these pages is not the Romagna we like to imagine. One might be tempted to read it through Tondelli—the lost generation, the dreams thrown overboard, the pills—or through Fellini’s Amarcord. But that would be convenient. The poetic realism of this sequence inhabits another dimension, far from caricatures, from the high Cs of hopeless stories, from the nostalgia for an Italy that no longer exists…