Böcker av Kate Fuglei

Too young to hear the drumbeat of a world preparing for war, little Federico daydreamed on the shores of Italy's Adriatic Sea. At night the boy soared over his provincial town, his head swimming with fantastical visions unconstrained by earthly boundaries and limitations. As he came of age, Federico Fellini found his soul in the heart of Rome. Through his work as a caricaturist and journalist he played a leading role in the city's avant-garde scene and soon found his inspiration behind the film camera. Fellini held tight to the world of childhood, imagination, and the dream state. His ability to capture the frailty and wonder of what it is to be human and to find irony, humor, and beauty in the life of postwar Italy earned him four best Foreign Language Oscars. Film directors worldwide study his craft in neo-realist masterpieces such as I Vitellonni, La Strada, La Dolce Vita, and 8 1/2-the magic of which gave birth to the well-familiar addition to our lexicon: Felliniesque.

The Soul of a Child places brilliant educator and reformer Maria Montessori in the context of her time. It examines the relationships, inner struggles and inspirations of Montessori, a woman with heart, empathy and resilience. As a strong woman who lived through two world wars, the rise of Fascism in Spain and Italy and the dawn of the nuclear age, she remained undeterred in her faith in the possibility of positive change through education. Her life spanned both the joys of innovation and the horrors of destruction of the twentieth century. Her influence on education and humanism remains resonant and enduring. This is her story.