Mario Soldati has achieved success in various genres. As an essayist he is engaging, urbane, and provocative; in fact, he is still best known as the author of America primo amore (America First Love), a collection of essays that has been reprinted six times since it was first published in 1935. As host of his two-year-long television series, Viaggio nella valle del Po alla ricerca di vini genuini (Voyage in the Po Valley in Search of Genuine Wines, 1955-1956), he became one of Italy's most popular figures. When his other television series, Alla ricerca del cibo genuino (In Search of Genuine Food), ended in 1959, he was as famous as a movie star. Soldati has also been active in the motion-picture industry as a director and critic as well as a screenplay writer. His most successful movie was Piccolo mondo antico (Little Old-Fashioned World, 1941).

Soldati excels in narrative fiction. In...