Contents
The main characters in the book are given pseudonyms from Margaret Mitchell's Gone with the Wind (1936). However, some of them have been identified, among them Cardinal Achille Silvestrini, Martinelli's former supervisor.
One anecdote in the book details a bishop being blackmailed by an illegitimate daughter. The book also raises questions about the death of Pope John Paul I. Another anecdote details an affair between a young priest at the nunciature in Berne, Switzerland and a nun, who are both reassigned – the nun significantly less gainfully – with the help of the priest's influential Vatican patron.
Read more about this topic: Gone With The Wind In The Vatican
Famous quotes containing the word contents:
“To be, contents his natural desire;
He asks no Angels wing, no Seraphs fire;
But thinks, admitted to that equal sky,
His faithful dog shall bear him company.”
—Alexander Pope (16881744)
“The permanence of all books is fixed by no effort friendly or hostile, but by their own specific gravity, or the intrinsic importance of their contents to the constant mind of man.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (18031882)
“Conversation ... is like the table of contents of a dull book.... All the greatest subjects of human thought are proudly displayed in it. Listen to it for three minutes, and you ask yourself which is more striking, the emphasis of the speaker or his shocking ignorance.”
—Stendhal [Marie Henri Beyle] (17831842)