Flavia Amabile on the Last Lemon Farmers of Amalfi

The first time I set foot in a lemon garden of Amalfi's Coast I was over thirty, and for more than twenty years I traveled around the beaches and hamlets of the Coast, without being any wiser of the life of the people living over the hills. A morning of the year 2000 I looked up to the terraces which model the hills, and I saw a man with a thick moustache emerge from the trees and walk on a pergola of chestnut logs. A few days later I learned that the man was over 80 years old, and in the following weeks I started to learn so much more. I learned that on Amalfi's Coast farmers are much more than just people who work in agriculture, and that lemons are much more than fruits. They are the saviors of a unique place, connected to a culture of gestures and rules unchanged by the centuries, not for some dull nostalgia, but because it would be impossible to harvest them in a different way. My travel through the world of Amalfi's lemons was made possible by the elderly living in the area: they are the last witnesses of a unique moment, when British and American ships used to come to be filled with lemons. Those times are long gone. Since World War 2, Amalfi's farmer became marginal, pointless. Amalfi Coast became a paradise for invading tourists, where ancient rocks were carved to create new parking lots, and old workshops disappeared to make way to souvenir shops. A new generation moved to the towns on the Coast to find better opportunities, and the hills remained empty. Gardens became uncultivated terrains, dry stone walls collapsed for lack of maintenance, and landslides, wildfires and rockfalls became the new normal, the first sign of an inescapable decay. As a journalist I did what I can do best: I wrote about it. I wrote several articles and a novel to warn about the risks for this wonderful place. I took thousands of pictures and dozens of videos to show the gestures and to record the memory of those who harvest lemons. This is the world you will find in this book: a world of farmers, of sweat, pain, strength, passion and attachment to the land. A land of which they are the last guardians, faithful keepers of a Coast that today is a golden prison of those who live in these enchanted, forgotten gardens. This book is for them, and for every person who dares to look up and wonder what hides behind the sea of Amalfi's.

— Flavia Amabile, from the introduction to I Contadini Volanti