This paper focuses on the mechanics of travel in Italy from the turn-of-the century to the 1950s. Through a systematic analysis of tourist guidebooks and popular travel writing, I examine the practical information and tips that the authors provide to prospective American travelers in order to recreate at different historical moments the lost and forgotten day-to-day lived experiences of travelers: everything from the cost of train, ocean liner, and plane tickets, to hotel amenities, tourist services, and traveler safety and comfort. Informed especially by Jeremy Black’s groundbreaking work on the mechanics of travel in eighteenth century Italy in Italy and the Grand Tour (1985), this paper highlights how the changing practical experiences of American travelers shaped how they interpreted Italy’s changing social and political realities in the first half of the twentieth century. Through the practical information on travel in the guidebooks, we glimpse at an ephemeral Italy that no longer exists: the Italy experienced by the tourists in that moment in time.
About the presenterDavid Aliano
David Aliano is an Associate Professor of Italian and History at the College of Mount Saint Vincent in New York City. He earned his Ph.D. and M. Phil. degrees from the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He received his B.A. degree from Fordham University. He is the author of Mussolini’s National Project in Argentina (Madison: Fairleigh Dickinson University Press, 2012). His research specializes in transnational Italian cultural history.