Amazon FeedaRead Amazon Category:  Literary Fiction ISBN-10:  1781767580 Type: Fiction Copyright: Sept 17th 2012 ISBN-13: 9781781767580 Vocazione takes the reader on an illuminating journey through the heart of the Eternal City, where a visit to the church of San Luigi dei Francesi forces two people to re-evaluate the basis of what they believe in and mean to each other. Excerpt Chapter 1 - Opening Credits "Tends to Amateurs" Of course, it's really not the same as when you watch it on the big screen. The way it seems that much closer and further away. I only saw it on the big screen once myself, lights that went out loud like a bar at last orders. Problem is like people, you never realise what those kind of opportunities are, when they tend to come along. The film, well that's different for everyone, but then who gets the chance to watch a classic movie, the way it was meant to be seen nowadays. You never think about the things you take in with you, or the things you leave behind. Old friends, receipts, loose change. By virtue of absence, a person who might have changed your life once, just never the person you want them to be. These are the laws of attraction we live by, another story behind the one on screen. Start with the first scene or even better, the opening credits. A well-known melody this, even if you don't know its name you'd hum along. The names of the players Joseph Cotton, Orson Welles, Valli, Trevor Howard and then the title frame in Carol Reed's Production of Graham Greene's 'The Third Man'. An instant box office phenomenon on both sides of the Atlantic, it went on general release in Britain on the 31st October 1949. I know this fact, the same way I know you like beans on toast, or that there're precisely seven steps at the fountain of Santa Maria in Trastevere. It's a place I've studied very carefully, small details that I try to keep in mind while the caption reads Vienna, except we're not in Vienna yet. We’re standing in a church dressed for the beach but it’s impossible. Tourists are milling around already drowsy with the heat, although it’s still not even midday. You’re wearing your hair up off your shoulders, and I’ve told you to close your eyes till we reach what we’re looking for. The sandal’s still a problem, I’ll have to try and fix it for you again when we leave. We’re quietly laughing at each other and it’s obvious to me now. Given the choice we’d rather be on opposite sides of the moon. Rome teaches you new words like pilgrims looking for the shade. They've been coming here for centuries, the church of San Luigi dei Francesi and the ever present crowd gathered around the Contarelli Chapel. Christ's outstretched arm and the light hitting the bearded Saint right between the eyes. Orson Welles smiles and says nothing as the Harry Lime theme plays. It's a masterpiece no question, an original film noir, The Vocation of St Matthew. A picture that sends you home satisfied, forgetful, all smiles and tears. So understated, how the line of natural light in the chapel finds the same angle, which offers Matthew his redemption in the canvas. Flashbacks four hundred years before the invention of the moving image. See how easily we move with seamless editing from first century A.D, to the Baroque, to a day in June. A memory safely retained without the burden of association, only here we should remember there are two other paintings adjacent and opposite: St Matthew and the Angel and The Martyrdom of St Matthew. A full life conveyed in three separate moments. When I took you to see it I thought, all pictures fade. Times I wonder what would have happened, if we'd said our goodbyes then, what a golden opportunity we squandered. Murderer. It was as though the word made up for lost time and I was suddenly inspired. An unnerving inclination life could ever turn out to be something quite so extraordinary. I wanted to impress you with the knowledge, Caravaggio's sordid past and mug shot. So absurd to think that the same hands that painted this killed a man. You didn't seem in the least bit surprised when I told you. Mercy passes by and moves on, someone is saved and no-one thinks to ask if they're sorry. The painting has little to do with forgiveness, something I discovered for myself much later, the same way I learnt things about you, what it took to convince (the same way a photograph convinces you) which one's a fake, which one's a laugh. Whose world is that the artist's or the criminal's? What did you see first, the money on the table, the weapons, the cross in the window? A man with his arm stretched out, but at what point did you realise this is Christ? You never spoke to me about it afterwards and yet, I remember that day more clearly than any other we spent together. It has its own set of facts, a particular cast and history. St Matthew, (still Matthew the Levite) isn't thinking about the job anymore. He's stuck in modern day, staring at someone more than a thousand years ago, afraid of misunderstanding. It got to him before he even had a chance to breathe, a ten minute wait by the Triton Fountain at Piazza Barberini, just a normal day where we decided not to go to the cinema. Easy to forget how much of the human imagination is invested in a city, or a place you've never been to. Take a leisurely afternoon stroll through this frozen thing, that's survived the high explosives. Shadows that can only be caused by either extreme heat or extreme cold. Things I wanted to say to you but couldn't put into words in front of Caravaggio. How you always liked to label me a creature of habit, same restaurants, same cafes and bars which for you, in its own odd way, seemed to make me an exception to the rule. Vienna then would be a complete change of scene for us both, a different time even. The way I kept everything you gave me, a lucky five centesimo piece, silver foil from a Perugina chocolate, the scraps of paper. If there was one thing you taught me, it was never to rely on a certainty, just a painting I could understand in simple terms. Truth is, you can't afford to assume anything. It's an old film at the end of the day, it knows what's coming. I forget the exact moment I made the connection between the film and the canvas. Trying to find my way around late January, I remember it was raining and the taxis loitering with their long head lights. There must always be something directly preceding, a building growing taller till I stand before the temple of all gods. The first time I saw the Pantheon I'd no idea what it was or how little time. I'd like to think there was something of my old life in that recognition, a reverse angle showing two very different works of art and points of view. The smile and look of shock behind your absence or your presence. A natural element for Caravaggio, shadows buzzing on a hotel wall building the seedy film noir tension. The other people there don't see it, the light goes off and I put some money in a hole in the wall like a jukebox and the light comes on again. Just another thousand years and I've no idea what you're thinking. So much of the canvas remains dark and I've no idea what you're thinking about now. The strange thing is whenever we spoke it was never about art or even films for that matter. I can't recall one single night, when we spoke about anything that existed outside where we were at any given moment and we could have been anywhere. I remember lots of movement in your hands and face, things you liked to tell me, but then too many things that upset you too quickly. A little awkward yet sincere, slightly inept at karaoke. You can't hope to convince anyone with that tone of voice. The weakest word I know both in its sound and in its meaning, whimsical. A confidence offered or withheld at the point of knowing. The early terror of a child’s game of hide and seek, an inexplicable nosebleed followed by laughter. Mercy and this distance between, where time itself is a kind of physical gesture. More the association that was amateur and only half conceived, the idea God sees everything, whatever it is you're doing now. Nothing at all like the time you asked me if I believed in God and I said I didn't know and right away you said you thought there was. Knowing so little and knowing so much, it's the same thing and always the light that reminds me. Quite simply the saddest thing I ever heard you say.

A Broken Sandal Meant Everything
J.D. Jones expertly weaves a journey into the story of Graham Greene's Third Man and Caravaggio's Vocation of St. Matthew by inviting us to trip through the winding dark alleys of Rome the way only a stranger can. We are propelled into the shadows by the promise of mystery and we go, willingly, daring the shadows to betray us. Jones tells the story of these two works as they impacted and reflected the story of his expat in Rome, who sets about learning a city with a girl who really did have no idea about this man struggling to fix her broken sandal. The strongest element of this book is the tone. Jones immediately captures the narrator's sense of wonder at how his life might just make sense in light of Green's Third Man and Caravaggio's Vocation. He develops this tone as he reveals more and more of the narrator's story: the loss of an old friend, the electricity in every detail of a new love, the disorientation of a new city, and the bitter knowledge that "home is just another word for how you'd do things differently." If you have ever fallen in love with a new city, heck, if you have ever fallen in love, consider picking this one up.