Italy travel: the glories of Trieste – then and now

‘Europiccola’ is enjoying a cultural resurge

(Image credit: Gordon Bell/Alamy Stock Photo)

published 17 April 2023

As the great seaport of the Habsburg empire, Trieste was a “thriving ethnic, financial and cultural crossroads”, dubbed “Europiccola” (Europe in miniature) by James Joyce. Then came the First World War, and the grand geopolitical shifts of the 20th century, which left it ever more isolated – hemmed in on three sides by the Iron Curtain, in the far northeast of Italy. In recent years, however, it has enjoyed a marked cultural resurgence, says Lee Marshall in the FT. The melancholy and nostalgia that Jan Morris evoked in her book Trieste and the Meaning of Nowhere are still present, but a “vibrant” art scene, fine new restaurants and stylish new hotels have brought fresh vitality to the city’s majestic old streets and squares.

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The Nobel Prize-winning Italian poet Eugenio Montale referred to Trieste as “the sole Italian city that derived its glory from its writers”. Joyce lived here between 1904 and 1915, teaching English and working on Dubliners and Ulysses. Among his students was the novelist Italo Svevo, and next to his apartment the poet Umberto Saba ran an antiquarian bookshop. It is still going strong, as are the Belle Époque and Art Nouveau cafés Joyce loved, including the Pasticceria Caffè Pirona, the Caffè San Marco (a “complete joy”), and the “oh-so-Viennese” Caffè degli Specchi. Opposite the last stands the city’s grandest hotel, the Duchi d’Aosta, with its two Michelin-starred restaurant, Harry’s Piccolo.

Among the city’s other highlights are the new Museum of Art in Fashion, the Stazione Rogers (an events space in a “cute” 1950s petrol station), and the “artisanal shops, bars and osterias” of the medieval Cavana district. But a visit to Trieste wouldn’t be complete without a trip into the surrounding countryside, with its distinctive “Italo-Slovene rural culture”, and – if you’re there in the warmer months – an afternoon at one of the long, sandy beaches that are within easy reach.