What is "The Lighthouse" by Arturo Vivante about?

The excerpt captures a moment in a boy's life that literary analysts call a rite of passage.
In the first part of the excerpt, the Italian boy learns about a foreign culture, that of Wales, on his first trip abroad on his own. He is exposed to new landscapes, the sea, wildlife, people, customs, and folkways. It is a life-changing summer for him, and what he doesn't know is that the world is about to change, too, with World War II looming.
In the latter part of the excerpt, the boy has returned to Wales, but this time he is not on an enrichment trip with family friends; he is a refugee, as his town in Italy has become occupied or otherwise devastated by the war. The lighthouse keeper who befriended him a year earlier does not recognize him; the intervening year has changed them both. Ultimately, the boy accepts that he has been forgotten as the visitor from the year before and moves forward in the new relationship. He has gained an adult understanding of the ravages of time; this is his rite of passage.