Rome, Italy

Critic John Powers says Italy's submission for the best foreign language film Oscar and a documentary about the Mexican drug war got him thinking about a William Blake proverb: "The road of excess leads to the palace of wisdom."

The star of 30 Rock has two films out this summer. He plays a club owner in the film adaptation of the Broadway musical Rock of Ages. And he travels to Italy with an ensemble cast for Woody Allen's To Rome with Love.

Ralph Fiennes' directorial debut adapts Shakespeare's Coriolanus, about a Roman general with his eye on political office. Critic David Edelstein says that in Fiennes' hands, the modern-day update makes for thrilling moviegoing.

In Mary Gordon's luscious, wistful new novel, two former lovers meet in Rome after not having seen each other for almost 40 years. Book critic Maureen Corrigan praises the book's "undeniable appeal."

Linguist Geoff Nunberg foregoes his usual language commentaries to tell us a tale about being young and limber in Rome.

Language commentator Geoffrey Nunberg looks back on the long nights he spent in a private club in Rome where the only requirement for membership was that you be a native-English speaker. He reflects on how the language brought together people who otherwise had nothing in common.