Capri has probably seen more dramatic events and more extraordinary people on its own soil and in the vicinity than any other small island in the world. Its rocks have been trodden by palaeolithic and neolithic troglodytes, by Greeks and Romans, by Lombards and Normans, Saracens and Turks, Italians, Frenchmen, Spaniards, Englishmen, and in our day, by people from all over the world. Its history presents a colourful gallery of distinctive characters: Emperor Augustus and Emperor Tiberius, the depraved Gaius Caligula, the adventurous Herod Agrippa, later king of the Jews, St. Constantius, the beautiful Queen Joan, the dreaded pirate Kheir-ed-Din Barbarossa, the ecstatic nun Serafina, the eccentric Sir Nathaniel Thorold, the treasure-hunting excavator Norbert Hadrawa, the South State colonel John Clay MacKowen, the cannon king Friedrich Alfred Krupp, the Baron Jacques d'Adelswärd Fersen, Lenin, Maxim Gorky, Norman Douglas, Axel Munthe, and many, many more.
This book concerns chiefly these peoples and others whose lives and works in one way or another are associated with Capri. For the sake of historical continuity, however, excursions in time and space are made into the world beyond this little island's waters.
By Arvid Andrén. 250 pages. ISBN: 978-91-85058-98-3.
