San Frediano

This guide to San Frediano in Florence follows Vasco Pratolini's nineteen forty-nine novel The Girls of San Frediano, set in these lanes in the last months of the Second World War around a mechanic nicknamed Bob for his resemblance to Robert Taylor. It traces how Bob juggles six women at once, Tosca, Bice, Silvana, Gina, Loretta, and Mafalda, each convinced she is the only one, and what happens once they start comparing notes. You'll also hear about Porta San Frediano, the fortified gate finished in thirteen thirty-two that a foreign king once rode through, generations before Bob's story.