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A Season With Verona [Paperback]

Tim Parks (Author)
4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (50 customer reviews)
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Book Description

Publication Date: 6 Mar 2003

Is Italy a united country, or a loose affiliation of warring states? Is Italian football a sport, or an ill-disguised protraction of ancient enmities?

Tim Parks goes on the road to follow the fortunes of Hellas Verona football club, to pay a different kind of visit to some of the world's most beautiful cities. This is a highly personal account of one man's relationship with a country, its people and its national sport. A book that combines the pleasures of travel writing with a profound analysis of one country's mad, mad way of keeping itself entertained.

(20021018)

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Product details

  • Paperback: 464 pages
  • Publisher: Vintage; New Ed edition (6 Mar 2003)
  • Language: English
  • ISBN-10: 0099422670
  • ISBN-13: 978-0099422679
  • Product Dimensions: 12.9 x 2.7 x 19.8 cm
  • Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (50 customer reviews)
  • Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 31,298 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Product Description

Amazon Review

For the last few months Anglo-Italian novelist Tim Parks has been writing of his devotion to Italian football club Hellas Verona in The Guardian. In A Season with Verona we get a chance to read the full and absorbing narrative that lay behind those short snippets.

In some ways the book is a standard travelogue. In following his lowly Series A team in their seasonal slog around Italy, Parks gets to visit all the famous sights and cities. What makes this journey so different and so interesting is that Parks is accompanied by vividly ordinary, honestly working-class, determinedly urban Italians and gets to share their Nick Hornbyish highs and lows. This in turn provides a credible, fresh and revealing insight into the Italian character. These fans do all the normal soccer-supporter things like fight, drink, despair, exult, rant and put each other in comas; but they also do more surprising things, like sing songs in praise of the murderous Liverpool fans of Heysel and give voice to racist feelings about their southern compatriots.

This may not sound like most people's image of southern loveliness. Indeed it isn't. But it is a much needed antidote to all that saccharine-sweet Under The Tuscan Sun stuff; and it also makes this book a splendid bedside companion to the Italian campaign in the next, or indeed any, World Cup. --Sean Thomas --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

"Addictive reading...each chapter is a short story, the whole book an epic" (Observer )

"Parks knows his football, and he knows Italy still better. His adopted country, in all its enduring and exasperating strengths and weaknesses, comes vividly to life" (Sunday Times )

"A fascinating emotional journey... His descriptions of Italian football are descriptions of Italy itself, its regional differences, its squabbles, its distinctive temper" (Daily Telegraph )

"An enthralling, insightful account of the real Italy" (Independent )
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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews
17 of 18 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars amazing book not only for football fans 2 May 2002
By A Customer
Format:Paperback
As a long term Sheffield Wednesday fan I was most pleased to find this book on the shelf of my favourite bookshop a couple of weeks ago. I've always loved stories about football, but especially about mad football ites, people like myself who follow their beloved team week in and week out. Although I've never been to Verona and I don't know anyone in Italy, I felt like I have an awful lot in common with the people Mr Parks amazingly describes. The excellent thing about this book however, is that even people who are not particularly keen on football, can easily read it. It clearly emerges from the pages of this manuscript that Mr Parks is not only a passionate supporter of Hellas Verona, but also a clever academic. At some stages of the book i envied the author for his incredibly huge ability to describe the emotions us football fans go through during a whole season.
Needless to say that although it is quite a thick book (about 450 pages) I read it in less than two days.
Thanks Mr Parks for sharing your passion with us readers, I wish you all the best for your professional life and your team.
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6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars A Season to Remember! 28 July 2005
By R. P. Sedgwick VINE™ VOICE
Format:Hardcover
A great book loosely based upon Verona's epic 2000-2001 Season in Serie A. The book is in diary form, so the author, like the reader, doesn't know the eventual outcome when he writes each chapter. This somehow adds to the excitement whilst reading it.

As well as Verona the book covers many asides in all sorts of areas such as Italian politics, hooliganism, life in Italy, the Italian language, racism, the difference between the north and the south, the bias towards the big clubs and the Italian police's awful treatment of away fans.

My favourite part was the description of the regular supporters of Verona, and their travels to away games (the first chapter is an absolute classic). Parks clearly adores Italy and his enthusiasm for the country is infectious (I challenge anyone not to want to stand on Verona's Curva Sud after reading this book). Parks also gets to interview some of the players, management and club owners which adds to the pure adventure of the unfolding tale.

At the end of the day - despite all the differences between Italy and England - the comforting fact to know is that being a fan of any football team, especially a small, unfashionable one, is essentially the same.

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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars not what I expected, but the better for it. 15 May 2002
By stevebassnet907@hotmail.com
Format:Hardcover
This is one strange book. It starts with about fifty pages introducing you to these hard core fans on a long long away game. It's fun and you think. Right, it's going to be one of those books. And instead then it changes, and it changes again and again, with all the weirdest ways of thinking about football or describing games. At first some of it's a bit off-putting and you think maybe it's going to get pseud, but as it goes on, talking about the players, and girl fans, and the football calendar and Italy, you realise what he's really talking about is all the ways football invades you head and what it means that you let it do that and that you experience emotions that maybe have nothing to do with the 'important' things in your life. Anyway, a great book, I really really enjoyed it and read some of the sections twice. Can't understand ..being predictable. Don't think I've ever read a book that turned out to be more different than I first thought.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars Amazing Book
HELLAS in A again - Today 18 March 2013.
Great Book, very interesting and passionate. A true introspection of best italian ultras.
Published 5 days ago by Matteo
4.0 out of 5 stars A side of Italy the tourists don't see
I'd not read anything by Tim Parks before, and quite frankly the appeal in this book was that it promised to show a side of Italian life that the tourists never see - and quite... Read more
Published 12 months ago by N. Young
5.0 out of 5 stars Must for anyone who loves European Football
Must for anyone interested in Italian Football and to a lesser extent Italian culture. Was first recommended to me by a friend, and then it was quoted in another brilliant book... Read more
Published 19 months ago by Chrisp
5.0 out of 5 stars Enlightening, inspiring and funny
Having never been to Italy I always thought of this country and its culture as something of an enigma. Read more
Published on 6 Feb 2011 by A. Bond
5.0 out of 5 stars wonderful football italy tim parks
loved every page of this book.one of the best books ever from the first page to the last. tim parks what a writer.
Published on 2 Nov 2010 by paolo50
5.0 out of 5 stars An Englishman's view
This book starts off brilliantly with the tale of a boozy, drug-fuelled organised coach journey for Verona fans to a far-flung away match. Read more
Published on 31 Aug 2010 by Tim Roast
5.0 out of 5 stars Not just a football book
Tim Parks, author, academic, and supporter of his adopted home town club, Hellas Verona, recounts in this book his travels to every match they play, home and away, throughout a... Read more
Published on 10 May 2010 by M. V. Clarke
5.0 out of 5 stars Old School Support
Reading this book brought back many memories of when I was a teenager and travelling far and wide supporting Celtic. Read more
Published on 17 Sep 2009 by H. Delaney
2.0 out of 5 stars A Season in Hellas
At the heart of this, it is a very decent book, but one that is written by someone with a relatively thin grip on the subject on the matter. Read more
Published on 3 Aug 2009 by Mr. Antonio Cavaldoro
5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliantly written, brilliant book.
I had always been aware of the book but had never got around to buying it. Anyone who is a fan of Italian football will enjoy the the references to the players and others will... Read more
Published on 23 July 2009 by A. Taylor
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