Growing up in 1950s Rome with a renowned American painter as your father gives you a skewed perspective of the world. But times change, and tastes change and maybe no one likes or understands your father’s art anymore, at least not in the way you once knew everyone should. And what is your life’s work in comparison? (And that’s not to mention your mother and her pottery -- what about her?) That’s Pinch Bavinsky’s struggle. The sad truth of The Italian Teacher’s world is that “relatives are judged relatively,” a truth no one buys into more than the relatives themselves. It’s devastating to witness Pinch’s decades-long scramble to free himself from his father’s achievement, with Tom Rachman using each jump forward in time to gently insert new layers of unsteady emotion.
