The Spirit of Rome

The Spirit of Rome is an account of Italian travel work written by Vernon Lee, the pseudonym of the British writer Violet Paget. She is remembered today primarily for her supernatural fiction and her work on aesthetics.

Author's Forward:

I was brought up in Rome, from the age of twelve to that of seventeen, but did not return there for many years afterwards. I discovered it anew for myself, while knowing all its sites and its details; discovered, that is to say, its meaning to my thoughts and feelings. Hence, in all my impressions, a mixture of familiarity and of astonishment; a sense, perhaps answering to the reality, that Rome—it sounds a platitude—is utterly different from everything else, and that we are therefore in different relations to it.