John Ferris wrote for the Associated Press, Newsweek, and the New York World-Telegram and Sun. He also published articles in The New Yorker, the New York Times Book Review section, Opera News, the Saturday Review of Literature, and other significant national publications. He was, as his managing editor described him, ?a mighty man at the typewriter, who savored a well-turned phrase or a deft shaft of whimsy at a gloomy world.? When he retired, Ferris learned to read and write Italian, amassed and digested a library of some two hundred books on Rome, and lived in and traveled about that beautiful, historic city many times. A gifted writer, he revealed his love of ?the enchanted city? through words didactic, insightful, witty, and amusing.