One after the other, the steps along the streets of Palermo, soles on its ballads, draw the shape of opposites. Palermo is misery and nobility; slowness and theatrical chaos; whimsy and deference. Palermo is light like no other and darkness that knows how to reach the most remote depths. Palermo, in short, is charm. But a complex charm, never really accessible. “Palermo is an onion,” Roberto Alajmo would say — because when you think you've reached its heart, she shows you another layer. So, this little book is meant to be a kind of dictionary. An itinerary through the city's many selves, which moves through the people who have lived it and the words that have told it; the stories that have inhabited it and the legends that have colored it; it passes through flavors, waves, scents, domes, saints and traditions. Go through opposites and pierce layers, to unmask the crudest beauty, which this city jealously guards. Book in Italian