This Is Rome

This Is Rome is one of those books where you open the first spread and immediately feel the weight of centuries settling around you, but in Šašek’s playful way, never solemn, never heavy. Rome in his hands is not a postcard city polished for tourists, it’s a living place, a bit chaotic, endlessly charming, full of tiny human moments that make it feel real.

Šašek sketches Rome with the amused affection of someone who understands that the city’s contradictions are exactly what make it irresistible. Ancient columns rise right out of modern traffic jams. A priest crosses paths with a boy chasing pigeons. The grandeur of the Vatican appears in the same breath as an old man sunning himself on a bench. Everything exists side by side, without explanation, because in Rome, it simply does.

What makes this book special is the balance between accuracy and personality. You recognize every landmark — the Forum, the Pantheon, the Trevi Fountain — but they never feel like obligatory stops on a tour. They feel observed. Lived in. He draws fountains as if you can hear the water, ruins as if they still remember their voices, and streets as if they’ve been walked a thousand times by real people with somewhere to go.

And then there’s Šašek’s humor: quiet, affectionate, never forced. A café scene that feels lifted from life; a Roman cat lounging like it owns the entire empire; tourists struggling with maps as confidently as emperors once commanded armies. His Rome isn’t idealized. It’s loved.

Even now, decades later, the book reads with the same freshness. It captures something that travel guides rarely manage: the feeling of being in Rome, not just looking at it. The slow afternoons, the noise, the light, the warmth, all distilled into drawings that somehow remain timeless.

This Is Rome isn’t just a guidebook for children. It’s a love letter to a city that refuses to stay still. And Šašek, with his elegant line and gentle wit, gives us Rome the way locals secretly hope visitors will see it: curious, observant, open-hearted, and completely unforgettable.