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REUTERS. The Vatican said on Saturday it had not yet decided whether to take legal action against the woman who lunged at Pope Benedict while calls grew for more efficient security to protect the pontiff. (Read the article)
NPR. Activists in Italy say the level of racism in the country has worsened in recent years, and a number of events in the run-up to Christmas would seem to support that view. A campaign against illegal immigrants, called "Operation White Christmas," has been taking place in a small town near Milan. (Listen the story by Silivia Poggioli)
THE NEW YORK TIMES. FROM a practical point of view, “The Charterhouse of Parma” makes a lousy guidebook. An ardent fan of all things Italian, and a brilliant, impressionistic travel writer, Stendhal could have bequeathed to the ages an unforgettable prose portrait of Parma, the small, sleepy, provincial northern Italian city where most of the action of his great novel takes place. (Read the article)
CBC. "Be Italian!" director Rob Marshall exhorts us with his new film, Nine. To judge from his movie, that means adopting a zesty accent, wearing dark glasses indoors and smoking incessantly – in other words, taking on only the most superficial aspects of Federico Fellini's 8½, the immensely influential masterpiece on which this slick but uninspired musical is based. (Read tbe article)
WALL STREET JOURNAL Pope Benedict XVI delivered his annual Christmas Day address and blessing before a packed St. Peter's Square on Friday, hours after being knocked violently to the floor by a woman who lunged at him before Christmas Eve mass. (Read the artice)
ANSA. More than half of Venice was under water Wednesday as two days of driving rain helped push the acqua alta (high water) to 143 cm above sea level, a record for the year and the 11th-biggest since records began. (Read the article)
ANSA. Naples is celebrating the Baroque movement with a sweeping initiative encompassing 13 exhibitions and hundreds of artistic and decorative masterpieces. Six of the southern city's museums are each hosting shows spanning a period of 150 years in total, starting with Caravaggio's arrival in Naples in 1606. (Read the article)
The New York Times. As the Paris correspondent for The New York Times, Stephen Erlanger, wrote here on Monday, European countries seem “less and less sure” why they are fighting. Here, Rachel Donadio in Rome looks at where Italy stands at the end of 2009. (Read the article by Rachel Donadio)
ANSA. ne of two famous columns in St Mark's square has been restored, a Venice conservation group said Tuesday. The column, topped with a statue of the city's early patron Saint Theodore, stands across the lagoon-front from the pillar with the Lion of St Mark on it. (Read the article)
ANSA. Florence has a host of spectacular exhibitions lined up for the coming year, the Tuscan city's museum chief Cristina Acidini announced on Tuesday. (Read the article)