The five of us in Rome

THE FIVE OF US IN ROME is the delightful story told by a young girl who arrives in Rome in 1892 almost five years old and who leaves in 1896 just nine years old. The story received the prize of the best book for girls in 1928 in Holland.

The girl's father is an art painter who rents an atelier and family living quarters in the Villa Strohl-Fern, a mansion full with other artists, situated in a lush park close to Villa Borghese and the Academies of Art. Nations had the Prix de Rome for their best young art talents to study in the Eternal City. The painter from Holland is older and comes with his wife and three children. Given the amassed artistic talent at the Villa and its particular role in art history Tine’s book has become a remarkable historical and cultural document as well.

When daughter Dientje gets ill with malaria the artist has to choose between his family and his desire of artistic fulfilment in Italy. All the while Tine’s eye and heart record how it is to be a young girl in a foreign land and in that garden between artists.

The translation in English includes many historical links that do not appear in the 1928 Dutch original. This is the second edition.