There was a time when the country used to be the opposite of the city (empty/full, nature/culture, poverty/wealth, tradition/modernity, physical work/sedentary work, separation/concentration); better still, the country was the absence of the city: an environment neither urban nor rural which preserves the productive function of the old country
Piero Orlandi
fron the introduction of In the open air, Castel Maggiore, Editrice Quinlan, 2011.