SUBJECT ONE

I live in a country of less than five million people (I recently discovered that even exotic Sicily has more inhabitants than Croatia) in which people tend to know most people, perhaps even people’s grandparents, by name, so you can imagine the kind of ripples even the inciest, winciest, tiniest personal porn scandal would create.

Even an issue like somebody’s cat giving birth to her kittens prematurely makes for a subject worthy of gossip here. How then to shut one—or even two—eyes to the fact that Croatia’s most popular pop singer Severina has had her private home porn video splashed over computer screens up and down the country?

Known for her pout, deep cleavage and the little cross around her neck (so that no one is left in any doubt about her immaculate Catholicism), Severina could try, like Britney once did, to claim she was still a virgin if it wasn’t for the fact that she’s the other side of thirty and therefore this might have a strange effect on her career.