What a house and garden in the Mediterranean should look like...

It is a famous English writer, M.M. Kaye (author of the "Far Parvillions") that struck me by describing exactly the feeling that Mediterranean houses and gardens arouse in people and the feeling towards life that people develop even after a few days spent on the Mediterranean coast or on a Mediterranean island: the passage I am referring to is on the "Villa Oleander" and taken from Ms. Kaye's crime novel "Death in Cyprus", that was first published in 1956 and revised in 1984.

"The house was high and old, weather-worn and beautiful. Its walls had been colour-washed a flaking and discoloured pink that had bleached to a warm, uneven shade of apricot, and the wrought-iron balconies and wooden shutters at the windows were a soft, faded, dusty emerald green. ... A short, flagged walk and six shallow stone steps led up to a massive front door whose heavy bronze knocker was green with age, and the garden was a neglected tangle of orange and lemon trees, figs, plum trees, oleanders, roses, and cascades of yellow and white jasmine. A vine grew along the wrought-iron of a balcony to the right of the front door, and water trickled from the mouth of a bronze dolphin into a deep pool full of lily pads and reeds; the sound of its fall providing a tinkling counterpoint to the cooing of pigeons from among the warm shadows of a gnarled olive tree."

By the way, if you would like to immerse yourself fully into the dreamy descriptions of houses and gardens on a Mediterranean island, take a look at the book and follow this link: Death in Cyprus

This book, in addition to its captivating plot, is full of vivid descriptions of everyday life not only in Cyprus but in all regions bordering the Mediterranean. It is particularly true for life on Mediterranean islands and perfectly befits Capri and the other islands scattered in the Gulf of Naples.