Ireland and Sicily are two islands with plenty of parallels

While the differences between the two islands are huge, the interconnections are intriguing.

Palermo in Sicily, overlooking Piazza San Domenico.

Not so long ago, the mention of Sicily brought to mind the imagery of the “mafia”: criminal warlords, impoverished mountain pastures, decaying villages, and Al Pacino as Michael Corleone and Robert de Niro as a young Vito Corleone.

More recently, the success of TV series such as Montalbano and The White Lotus, the triumph of movies like Melina, Il Postino, and Cinema Paradiso, cheap air travel, and the enthusiastic accounts of returning holidaymakers have reminded the world of Sicily’s extraordinary beauty and its all-embracing multi-storied civilisation.