Explore Florence on foot with these wonderful and insightful routes. Plan your time with the unique bird's-eye view illustrations that capture the spirit of this amazing city. Following these walks is like being shown around the city by an exceptionally knowledgeable friend. They're fun and they'll help you fit it all together. And you'll discover plenty of interesting things you never knew about the city along the way. Inside our guide you'll find: *Easy to find the way - the routes are shown on unique aerial-view maps giving you a detailed street layout as well as the look of your surroundings so you can really get your bearings. *Friendly, accessible information - the maps are supported by personal insights and advice, including food, drink and shopping along the way. We'll introduce you to all the must-see areas. *Most of the routes take about an hour - but if you're planning to fit all the sightseeing in as well then allow two to three hours. And if you want to make it a longer expedition it's easy to interlink the routes to make a day of it. Discover Florence on foot with this inspirational guide and unique bird's-eye view maps and illustrations.

Florence's world-famous Renaissance is brought to life in this anthology through the eyes of its most illustrious chroniclers. Beginning with Dante's vision of Inferno, teeming with his Florentine enemies, to the artist Cellini's swashbuckling adventures in High Renaissance Italy, and including the pioneering writings of Boccaccio, Ficino, Guicciardini and Vasari, this selection shows that in literature, as in art, Florence was a trailblazer. The city's long tradition of mesmerizing foreigners is celebrated in selections from Tobias Smollet, Henry James, D.H. Lawrence and Stendhal (whose rapturous impressions gave name to 'Stendhal syndrome'), while indigenous writers such as Curzio Malaparte and Vasco Pratolini paint a far grittier portrait of Florence under the looming cloud of Fascism and World War II. Salman Rushdie's dazzling novel The Enchantress of Florence takes inspiration from the city's gilded Renaissance past, while Mary McCarthy's masterful travelogue captures a bustling 20th century market city. George Eliot, Rainer Maria Rilke, Iris Origo and Penelope Fitzgerald are among the other brilliant writers whose stories illuminate the many faces of this fascinating city.

Woven through all these tales are the unique histories and mythologies of the regions of Southern Italy, encompassing Sicily, Calabria, Cantania, Basilicata, Apulia and Campania. Theocritus, Virgil and Ovid evoke a Sicily populated by Cyclopes and sea monsters, while in an excerpt from The Smile of the Unknown Mariner Vincenzo Consolo depicts the island in 1860, on the frontline in Italy's war of independence. The South's legendary legacy of brigandage and organized crime enlivens the stories of Leonardo Sciascia, Carlo Levi and Joseph Conrad. Curzio Malaparte and Norman Lewis immortalize the wreckage of Naples and the indomitable spirit of its people during World War II, and Elena Ferrante paints a spectacular portrait of a poor but vibrant Neapolitan neighbourhood in an excerpt from the bestselling My Brilliant Friend. Collectively, these entertaining tales plunge readers into the sometimes harsh and troubled, but always seductive and vital world of Italy's Mezzogiorno