LITMIR.BIZ

       Introduction

      ask any traveler to Europe’s “Boot” (lo Stivale), “Why Italy?” and he or she responds with the almost inarticulate bemusement of someone in the infatuation phase of a love affair. Italy is irresistible. We return again and again for the cuisines, the wines, the festivals, the unique regions and attitudes—all rooted in the very soil under the traveler’s feet.

      If you live in the West or speak any Romance or Germanic language, you can trace roots back to here, in the Roman and Greek Empires, even if you’re not Italian. Your diet probably depends in part—or entirely—on Italian cuisine: pizza, spaghetti and meatballs with parmesan and crusty garlic bread, minestrone, mineral water, Caesar salad (invented in Florida, actually, but since it’s named after Caesar…) and gelato. You may have salivated over Ferraris and Lamborghinis; perhaps you appreciate Italian style and the composure with which Italians approach life. They may promptly finish their midday espressos standing at narrow, high-top tables, but Italians will take three or four hours to enjoy a dinner that doesn’t begin until at least 8 p.m. Ah, simple pleasures.

      Italy From a Backpack is full of pleasures, too—stories of young people whose discoveries make delightful, even surprising reading. My co-editor, Mark Pearson, hatched this idea for books about youthful European travels when he returned home from studying art history in Rome and backpacking around Europe. He found that people weren’t so interested in viewing his 2,200 digital photos. Instead, they wanted to hear great stories.

      At the time, few, if any, books of stories were written by and for backpackers—even though, every year, nearly two million Americans ages 18 to 29, and hundreds of thousands of Brits, Canadians and Australians, head for Europe to travel, study and work. Most carry their worldly possessions on their backs, travel on shoestring

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