目录
Content
Chapter_1
Chapter_2
Chapter_3
Chapter_4
Chapter_5
Chapter_6
Chapter_7
Chapter_8
Chapter_9
Chapter_10
Chapter_11
Chapter_12
Chapter_13
Chapter_14
Chapter_15
Chapter_16
Chapter_17
Chapter_18
Chapter_19
Chapter_20
Chapter_21
Chapter_22
Chapter_23
Chapter_24
Chapter_25
Chapter_1
order to experience four months of pure pleasure, they didn't have any hang-ups about it.
Complimenti! Vai avanti! Congratulations, they would say. Go ahead. Knock yourself out.
Be our guest. Nobody once said, "How completely irresponsible of you," or "What a
self-indulgent luxury." But while the Italians have given me full permission to enjoy
myself, I still can't quite let go. During my first few weeks in Italy, all my Protestant
synapses were zinging in distress, looking for a task. I wanted to take on pleasure like a
homework assignment, or a giant science fair project. I pondered such questions as,
"How is pleasure most efficiently maximized?" I wondered if maybe I should spend all
my time in Italy in the library, doing research on the history of pleasure. Or maybe I
should interview Italians who've experienced a lot of pleasure in their lives, asking them
what their pleasures feel like, and then writing a report on this topic. (Double-spaced and
with one-inch margins, perhaps? To be turned in first thing Monday morning?)
When I realized that the only question at hand was, "How do I define pleasure?" and that
I was truly in a country where people would permit me to explore that question freely,
everything changed. Everything became . . . delicious. All I had to do was ask myself
every day, for the first time in my life, "What would you enjoy doing today, Liz? What
would bring you pleasure right now?" With nobody else's agenda to consider and no
other obligations to worry about, this question finally became distilled and absolutely
self-specific.
It was interesting for me to discover what I did not want to do in Italy, once I'd given
myself executive authorization to enjoy my experience there. There are so many
manifestations of pleasure in Italy, and I didn't have time to sample them all. You have to
kind of declare a pleasure major here, or you'll get overwhelmed. That being the case, I
didn't get into fashion, or opera, or cinema, or fancy automobiles, or skiing in the Alps. I
didn't even want to look at that much art. I am a bit ashamed to admit this, but I did not
visit a single museum during my entire four months in Italy. (Oh, man--it's even worse
than that. I have to confess that I did go to one museum: the National Museum of Pasta,
in Rome.) I found that all I really wanted was to eat beautiful food and to speak as much
beautiful Italian as possible. That was it. So I declared a double major, really--in speaking
and in eating (with a concentration on gelato).
The amount of pleasure this eating and speaking brought to me was inestimable, and yet
so simple. I passed a few hours once in the middle of October that might look like
nothing much to the outside observer, but which I will always count amongst the happiest
of my life. I found a market near my apartment, only a few streets over from me, which
I'd somehow never noticed before. There I approached a tiny vegetable stall with one
Italian woman and her son selling a choice assortment of their produce--such as rich,
almost algae-green leaves of spinach, tomatoes so red and bloody they looked like a
cow's organs, and champagne-colored grapes with skins as tight as a showgirl's leotard.
I selected a bunch of thin, bright asparagus. I was able to ask the woman, in comfortable
Italian, if I could possibly just take half this asparagus home? There was only one of me,
I explained to her--I didn't need much. She promptly took the asparagus from my hands
and halved it. I asked her if I could find this market every day in the same place, and she
said, yes, she was here every day, from 7:00 AM. Then her son, who was very cute, gave
me a sly look and said, "Well, she tries to be here at seven . . ." We all laughed. This
whole conversation was conducted in Italian--a language I could not speak a word of only
a few months earlier.VIKING
Published by the Penguin Group
Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street,
New York, New York 10014, U.S.A.
Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East,
Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3
(a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)
Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London
WC2R 0RL, England
Penguin Ireland, 25 St. Stephen's Green, Dublin 2,
Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd)
Penguin Books Australia Ltd, 250 Camberwell Road,
Camberwell, Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of
Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd)
Penguin Books India Pvt Ltd, 11 Community Centre,
Panchsheel Park, New Delhi - 110 017, India
Penguin Group (NZ), Cnr Airborne and Rosedale Roads,
Albany, Auckland 1310, New Zealand (a division of
Pearson New Zealand Ltd)
Penguin Books (South Africa) (Pty) Ltd,
24 Sturdee Avenue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196,
South Africa
Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices:
80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
First published in 2006 by Viking Penguin,
a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2
Copyright (c) Elizabeth Gilbert, 2006
All rights reserved
LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING IN PUBLICATION DATA
Gilbert, Elizabeth, date.
Eat, pray, love: one woman's search for everything
across Italy, India and Indonesia / Elizabeth
Gilbert p. cm.
ISBN 0-670-03471-1
1. Gilbert, Elizabeth, date--Travel. 2. Travelers'
writings, American. I. Title.
G154.5.G55A3 2006
910.4--dc22[B] 2005042435
Printed in the United States of America
Set in Italian Garamond with Tagliente Display
Designed by Elke Sigal
Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication
may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any
form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise),
without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher
of this book.
The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other
means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please
purchase only authorized electronic editions and do not participate in or encourage
electronic piracy of copyrightable materials. Your support of the author's rights is
appreciated.
For Susan Bowen--
who provided refuge
even from 12,000 miles away
Tell the truth, tell the truth, tell the truth.*
--Sheryl Louise Moller
* Except when attempting to solve emergency Balinese real est