Passions and Compassions

In what is now the tenth volume of Giovanni Bonello’s highly successful series, the author shows that far from running out of interesting persons, themes or anecdotes to write about, he keeps on finding topics that are more engrossing than ever.  These include what is the most sensational chapter of the book, bearing the title “Dun Gaetano Mannarino – ‘false and deceitful idol’” in which he tears down the façade of noble patriotism placed since the 19th century in front of this figure of a man who, far from being heroic, betrayed in his fear all his fellow-conspirators against the Order of St John in 1775.  Even fiercer is his “The internati – and who should be ashamed” where Bonello’s indignation at the very grave injustice done in 1942 by the British colonial government in exiling a good number of Maltese with Italian leanings, some of them very eminent, to Uganda for the duration of the war, is made sharper by the fact that the author’s father, Vincenzo Bonello, was one of the internees.

Two of the chapters show the author writing as enjoyably as ever about warring and mayhem.  His chapter on the English pirate John Ward and his exploit with the Order’s galleys is rendered specially interesting by a well-argued theory that Ward’s alleged capture of a galley in what was claimed to be 1605 probably corresponds to an episode of 1604 where the capture of two galleys of the Order was speedily followed by a crushing defeat of the pirates by the Order’s navy.  The chapter on knights belonging to the Pagano family, one of whom was publicly beheaded in Naples, is rendered grim by old images of executions.

“Patronage by the Knights of Malta” will undoubtedly be useful to the art historian but also to the many people of all sorts who are interested in the buildings and works of art belonging to their town or village.  Modern Malta owes many of the fine things it has to grand masters and ordinary knights who, if wealthy, chose to be remembered by embellishing buildings with expensive works of art, commissioning the building of places like the Manoel Theatre, erecting libraries, encouraging talented musicians and artists.
The chapter “A brawl off Strait Street, Valletta, 1828” is a vivid account of episodes involving the Royal Navy and the brothels or music halls in Strait Street.  Rare photographs and images of paintings depicting this formerly infamous street should make this chapter of special interest to older readers who still remember Strait Street in colonial times.

Chapters on insanity in Malta at the time of the Knights, a well-illustrated chapter on Sliema in pre-War postcards, castrati singers in Valletta and Mdina, and on the once famous and now all but forgotten prelate Nicholas Bonett, philosopher and Bishop of Malta, are among the remaining chapters of this engrossing and, as ever, richly illustrated, book.

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CONTENTS

Nicholas Bonet - The Greatest Bishop of Malta

John Ward, English Pirates and the Knights of Malta

Do Mysteries still lurk behind the history of the Great Siege?

Three Pagano Knights and Killers

Patronage by the Knights of Malta

Castrati Singers for St John's

Insanity in Malta at the Time of the Knights

Dun Gaetano Mannarino - 'False and Deceitful Idol'

Maltese 19th Century Commercial Instruments and their Adornment

A Brawl off Strait Street, Valletta, 1828

Horatio Agius, Memory of Victorian Malta

Sliema in Pre-war Postcards

The Internati - and who should be ashamed

Art as Power and Anti-Power

Brocktorff at the National Library

Interviews for 'Sunday Circle'

The Right Stuff

Coins that Shout History

Collecting Collections

Provenance

Index