Sicily inspires strong emotions, and few who travel there fail to come away with conflicting feelings about the island and its people. Plato thought it a place of great potential until the harshness of everyday life there became plain to him; in the end, he could endure no more than a stay of a few weeks. Goethe fell in love with its cloudless blue skies and scenic coastline – parts of which (such as at Taormina and Monte Pellegrino) he reckoned to be among the most beautiful spots on earth – and his insights into the culture and economy led him to conclude that the island was “the key” to understanding all of Italy. But, even so, he recoiled from the poverty and meanness he saw in each city and hurried back to the mainland as soon as he could. And Bertrand Russell, who always had a sharp eye for what pleased him and a sharper tongue for what did not, thought the island to be “unimaginably beautiful” but the people to be “a revelation of human degradation and bestiality.” My own first impressions remain vivid: blazing heat, a ubiquitous scent of lemons, the flowers and songs of a saint's-day festival in a mountain village, a riotous fishing expedition off Pantelleria, the mosaics of the cathedral in Monreale.