The Sun at MiddayThe Sun at Midday
Tales of a Mediterranean Family
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Book, 1997
Current format, Book, 1997, 1st ed, No Longer Available.Book, 1997
Current format, Book, 1997, 1st ed, No Longer Available. Offered in 0 more formatsThis astonishing memoir is the story of a family who always felt slightly foreign in every country and developed a chameleon-like ability to adapt to their surroundings. Gini Alhadeff was born in Alexandria, Egypt, and grew up in Cairo, Khartoum, Florence, and Tokyo. She draws on her own memory and that of her family to trace her Catholic upbringing, the Sephardic Jewish roots she discovered as a young woman, and the Italian colony on Rhodes where her paternal grandfather was a merchant banker until Mussolini's racial laws forced him to leave for Egypt. With a vivid gift for narrative, Alhadeff evokes the languid Alexandria of the early decades of this century (where her mother's family made its fortune in cotton) and some of its beguiling honorary citizens: a violet-eyed aunt who refused to have new slipcovers made for her sofa so President Nasser would find the worn ones when her house was impounded; a cousin who was taught the limits of reason by Wittgenstein at Cambridge and became a monsignor; a gynecologist uncle interned at Auschwitz and then Buchenwald, who lived to tell his tale with stark unsentimentality.
An intriguing, heartwarming memoir of an eccentric family describes growing up in the cosmopolitan worlds of North Africa, Florence, and Tokyo; her parents' richly diverse backgrounds; and her extraordinary relatives. 12,500 first printing.
With a brilliant flair for narrative and language, Alhadeff spins a tale--both wildly humorous and deeply affecting--of her beguilingly uncommon family. 272 pp. 12,500 print.
A memoir of an eccentric family describes growing up in the cosmopolitan worlds of North Africa, Florence, and Tokyo
An intriguing, heartwarming memoir of an eccentric family describes growing up in the cosmopolitan worlds of North Africa, Florence, and Tokyo; her parents' richly diverse backgrounds; and her extraordinary relatives. 12,500 first printing.
With a brilliant flair for narrative and language, Alhadeff spins a tale--both wildly humorous and deeply affecting--of her beguilingly uncommon family. 272 pp. 12,500 print.
A memoir of an eccentric family describes growing up in the cosmopolitan worlds of North Africa, Florence, and Tokyo
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- New York : Pantheon Books, c1997
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