Allan Gurganus

The Practical Heart' was published one week before the World Trade towers collapsed. Book reviewing and all else in our culture stopped dead-still for half a year. I went on the book tour anyway. But I felt like the apostle Paul going unto the catacombs where scared believers hid and prayed.

American Novelist

Catacombs are significant in history especially regarding burial traditions in ancient societies.

Historical significance

Catacombs are often tourist sites, where people can walk through the corridors underground.

Underground exploration

Catacombs are referenced in literature and films as mysterious or haunting places.

Cultural reference

 The Etruscans built expansive necropoles, their grid-patterned streets lined with tombs. In Rome, subterranean catacombs housed both cremation urns and intact remains.

The fascinating history...

 support our inner frameworks provide they've had a pretty bad rap to send sixty feet under the streets of Paris into its catacombs hundreds of