word: inanition
context:
Brazil[’s] consultate in Naples … occupied a vast and gloomy suite with high ceilings and the finest veil of dust in a distinguished Umbertine palazzo two blocks in from the Bay of Naples. … A hundred years earlier, hundreds of thousands of southern Italian peasants had sailed steerage for Brazil from Naples. Now a third of Brazilians were of Italian descent, and some of the richest among them. The rich came to Italy to spend and poor Brazilians, if they could, would come to Italy to make their fortune. … The Naples consulate was dying of inanition.
definition (Merriam-Webster): emptiness; exhaustion; the absence or loss of social, moral, or intellectual vitality or vigor
source:
A Death in Brazil: a book of omissions
by Peter Robb
2004. A John McRae Book / Henry Holt & Co., New York
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