Scribbles from Italy

Vian Andrews’ “Scribbles from Italy” are posted on Dooney’s every two weeks.

 

This page functions as a table of contents for the series, and will be updated as new instalments are added. 

Scribbles from Italy: The Centre of Things, Last Days in Canada, And So It Begins

Feb 12, 2023

Canadian writer Vian Andrews and his wife moved from Vancouver to Umbria in Italy. Here are his “scribbles” from a new place in the world.

Scribbles from Italy: The Big Valley, Here’s to the Big Brain, No Turn Around, Breeding Ground…

Feb 26, 2023

Vian Andrews’ dispatches from the Umbrian countryside welcome the light and rage against its dying.

Scribbles from Italy: The Thing About Sex; Standards of Measurement; Simplifications; No Oil…

Mar 12, 2023

Vian Andrews hiking and thinking in the Umbrian countryside, amid olive groves in the rain and “sentieri” paths between mountain hamlets.

Scribbles from Italy: Intelligence

Mar 24, 2023

Vian Andrews is out in the olive orchards, clearing brush from under the trees and thinking about ChatGPT and the future of artificial and other kinds of intelligence. The latest passage from Andrews’ journal about life in the Umbrian countryside, “Scribbles from Italy.”

Scribbles from Italy: The Awakening Mind, Old Habits, My Review…, The Disconnect, Absent the Movie House, Heat, No Paradise on Earth

Apr 7, 2023

More passages from Vian Andrews’ journals about life in Italy’s Umbrian countryside. He’s thinking about books, silence, pruning tools, theatres, Bob Dylan, and the fall of Afghanistan to the Taliban.

Scribbles from Italy: Italy in Layers, The Blaze, The Web Woven, The Burn, The Stranger’s Eye

Apr 22, 2023

More passages from Vian Andrews’ journals of living in Italy’s Umbrian countryside, a world of mountain hamlets, memories of dancing around the fire pit, old knife-grinders, and burnng the cuttings.

Scribbles from Italy: The Winds Do Blow, Orgasms & Anti-Vaxxers, Setting the Table, The Stink of Modern Life

May 6, 2023

From Vian Andrews’ journals about life in Italy’s Umbrian countryside: reflections on the winds that blow, full course meals, the stench of daily life, and even orgasms and anti-vaxxers.

Scribbles from Italy: The Clang of the Past, Shouts and Hollers, The Slaughter of the Politicians, Entanglements

May 20, 2023

Passages from Vian Andrews’ journals about living in Italy’s Umbrian countryside. He’s thinking about church bells clanging, children’s playgrounds, medieval donkey races, the brutal games of politics, and the bloody chore of pruning brambles and thorn bushes.

Scribbles from Italy: The Garden of Innocence, Bird Song, Fate of the Chicken, Going Cold, Doing Stuff, Winds That Blow.

Jun 3, 2023

Passages from Vian Andrews’ journals about life in the Umbrian countryside. Taking the kids to the park, the Thanksgiving lunch, a bird song of pain, farmers ploughing their fields, cold houses, and the wind in the olive groves — the settings in which a little wisdom might be found.

Scribbles from Italy: Men Who Know How, Hurt Words, Permission, Meta Metaverse, A Pressing Time

Jun 17, 2023

Vian Andrews’ journals from Italy’s Umbrian countryside include woodpiles, competent workers, words that hurt, bureaucratic permits, Sunday theme-parks, and lots of olives, harvested and pressed, and olive oil drizzled on hot grilled bread.