Whenever, after a long absence, I return to Naples, that beautiful and wounded city, I find myself looking forward to bedtime, to the first few moments of falling asleep. I always stay in one of the more populous quarters, in a room overlooking a steep, narrow street, and as I throw open my window a vast wave of sound floods over me. Settled in bed, I'm disconcerted at first by the sheer volume, by my feeling of floating helplessly in a tide of half-drowned voices, people calling or quarrelling, snatches of jokes, television commercials, soccer games, ghosts of song twisted by the wind; footfalls mingle with rasping scooters, a baby's crying with the honking of horns.

Yet soon the noises soothe me and, suspended between wakefulness and sleep, I enjoy a sensation of homecoming, of rejoining a crowd of kindred spirits, faces I have always known. The sounds summon up mental pictures and in my mind's eye I can see the one-room street beneath my window, I can see those tiny street-level flats, with their open windows and monumental, tomblike beds, and gold-embossed icons of the Madonna. I can see the old ladies gossiping in chairs along the sidewalk and the kids revving up their bikes at the corner, I can see the circolo sociale where grizzled gents play scala under a neon strip, smoking, coughing, trading affectionate insults.