Its historical breadth and richness notwithstanding, From Pompeii is a surprisingly intimate book. Rowland begins with her first encounter with Herculaneum as an 8-year-old with a Brownie Starmite camera From Pompeii is thus a personal, even idiosyncratic, introduction to Pompeii in the mode of, say, the novelist E. M. Forsters Alexandria: A History and a Guide If you have any interest in Pompeii, or in entertaining scholarship, or in Italian culture, youll want to set aside a few evenings for this deeply engaging work of popular history. -- Michael Dirda * Washington Post *
[Rowlands] book is a personal, indeed highly selective, account of what many researchers, cultivated visitors, archaeologists and even urban reformers have made of the site and the modern town of Pompeii: It reads, all told, like a collection of entertaining essays. She handles her theme with an ease and authority that should please others who are fond of Campania, the Neapolitan region, an area of great beauty and equally great social and environmental problem Rowland covers a wide range of topics, including the creation of the modern town of Pompeii, the musings of tourists like Dickens and Mark Twain, and diverse aspects of Neapolitan folklore. -- Dan Hofstadter * Wall Street Journal *
Elegant, witty and beautifully produced It is less a guide than an overtly aesthetic appreciation of the site and its environs, poetic in its sense of connections over time It is more the gap between individual drama and universal catastrophe, both inside Pompeii and looking on from outside, that Rowlands account so powerfully conjures up. -- Emily Gowers * The Guardian *
[A] lively book For Pompeii is not really frozen in time. The achievement of Rowlands book is precisely to show it at the heart of a turbulent, ever-changing region, where the landscape and people are forever caught up in transformation and dramawhether geological, political, technological or cultural. She beautifully evokes the connections between the local, the international, the spiritual and the seismic For Rowland, Pompeii is the fount from which innumerable rivulets of history flow, and her fluent and engaging writing follows them where it will This is a vivid and stimulating account of the history of a corner of the earth where there seems too much colorful humanity ever to be adequately captured in a single book. Rowlands brimming pages show there are plenty more treasures to be excavated from the fertile volcanic soil of its history. -- Rebecca Langlands * Times Higher Education *
Theres probably no one more qualified to have a go at this subject than Rowland She possesses unsurpassed knowledge of whatever she takes up, and this work is no exception It will delight any reader who likes the serious laced with the macabre and bizarre, the ancient with the modern We never tire of her deeply knowledgeable entertainment [A] genial, learned travelogue Its one of the pleasures of Rowlands tour that we get to meet with Pompeiis visitors over the centuries, as varied a cast of characters as might be dreamed up While this is in no sense a guidebook to Pompeii and Herculaneum, anyone planning to visit Italys southwest coast will gain from taking Rowlands fast-paced historical tour beforehand [A] splendid book. -- James M. Banner, Jr. * Weekly Standard *
This is a book difficult, even impossible, to summarize Rowlands enthusiasm for her subject and her knowledge of history are such that many will find interest and pleasure in dipping into it, pulling out a plum here or there. -- Allan Massie * Literary Review *
Visitors to Pompeii have long marveled at the towns perfectly preserved scenes of Roman life, but interpretations of those scenes have varied widely over the years. Rowland writes about a selection of those visitors, some famouslike Renoir, whose painting style was influenced by the towns erotic frescoesothers less well knownlike a priest named Father Kircher, who risked the wrath of the Inquisition when he suggested that the eruption of Vesuvius was in response to gigantic cycles within the earth itself rather than Gods pique at individual sinners. Each story speaks to the way in which Pompeii reveals the hopes and the desires of the individuals and of societies. -- Andrea DenHoed * New Yorker *
[Told] in rich and fascinating detail When Rowland tells us that a visit to Pompeii can change a persons life, she is speaking from personal experience. -- Tom Holland * The Spectator *
From Pompeii is immensely lively and thought-provoking The book is crammed with telling details and entertaining snippets. -- Chloe Chard * Sunday Telegraph *
The book is an entertaining canter through two millennia of history, deeply learned without succumbing to stuffiness or superiority Rowland is a lively writer and her tale of Pompeiis rediscovery and excavation is engaging. She skillfully brings to light details of the world unearthed at Pompeiithe various styles of painting identified by art historians, the social purpose of the god Priapusand splices these into her narrative of discovery. In the process she never loses sight of the relationship between this recovery of antiquitys physical remains and the 18th centurys vibrant neo-classicism. The former clearly nourished the latter, but the story turns out to be more complicated than first thought. -- Luke Slattery * Sydney Morning Herald *
[An] engaging look at the allure of an ancient city. -- Vanessa Bush * Booklist *
The book is an enjoyable read that encompasses an exciting range of topics in political and social history Recommended for general readers who want to know more about a place that continues to haunt the imagination of nearly everyone who visits it. -- Linda Frederiksen * Library Journal *
[Rowland] constructs an overview of Pompeiis history by collecting the opinions and work of famous figures: artists, writers, musicians, actors, and royalty, including Renoir, Mozart, Ingrid Bergman, and Crown Prince Hirohito of Japan. All of the individuals included experienced Pompeii and its environs firsthandthough some, like Mark Twain and Charles Dickens, did not always see them in a positive light. Rowlands work, replete with lyrical verse and beautiful descriptions of Southern Italy, highlights potential problems with preservation, andit wistfully captures the atmosphere of a place both beautiful and dangerous. * Publishers Weekly *
Ingrid D. Rowlands richly learned From Pompeii is a wonderfully well-written, funny, fascinating, and oddly poignant tour through the many afterlives of the ancient city. This is a brilliant book about the pleasures and perils of archaeology, historical preservation, and cultural tourism, stumbling over one another in a quixotic search for the traces of the dead. -- Stephen Greenblatt, author of The Swerve: How the World Became Modern
Original, highly illuminating, and funbrimming with ideas and observationsand many surprises for those familiar with Pompeii as well as for new visitors to the Bay of Naples. This is classic Rowland! -- Kenneth Lapatin, J. Paul Getty Museum
