Hello,
It’s been a while since my last post. Over the past months, I’ve struggled to find the time to sit down and write reviews. There are so many books I’ve read lately that I want to share with you! I might be exploring a different format over the coming months to make sure I’m able to do so. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy this month’s review.
mariana
Why did I read this book?
Two of the authors I admire most are Italian women: Goliarda Sapienza and Elena Ferrante. I was lucky to be in Italy earlier this summer, and I took the opportunity to visit different bookshops asking for new recommendations. I was hoping to discover female authors that sparkled similar feelings to those that these two wonderful women bring up for me.
A very kind lady in Milan took my request seriously and wrote me a precious list of authors she thought I might like based on my descriptions. Elsa Morante was her top one recommendation for me. She did not disappoint. I’m really looking forward to reading more of her books and to learning more about her.
What is the book about?
A coming-of-age story: Our protagonist Arturo is born in Procida, an island close to Naples, in the 1930s. Arturo’s mother dies during childbirth and his father is mostly absent. Inspired by his surrounding natural landscape and the books in his house, Arturo spends his days seeking adventures with his dog, Immacolatella. In his loneliness, Arturo starts to develop views about what the world is all about, and he slowly crafts internal narratives around what he thinks are the absolute certainties of life. When Arturo is 14, the first woman walks into his life, and he’s forced to confront his thoughts around these absolute certainties as well as new thoughts and feelings that he doesn’t seem equipped to deal with.
Gender norms and roles: This book was first published in 1957 and it covers a series of interesting topics in the background: misogyny, homosexuality, incest, religion. Morante was able to paint a picture of how womanhood and manhood were viewed at the time. I was particularly impressed by how Morante was able to showcase the way hate and violence towards women can be passed from one generation to the next.
Absence: Arturo is left to his own devices from a very young age. While there were books in the house in which he grew up, Arturo has no formal education, no friends, no adults to guide him or even hear him speak. Therefore, Arturo is forced to fill in the blanks of life by himself. As an adult reader, you might find yourself trying to piece all the information together, trying to make sense of what Arturo is unable to perceive.
“When a girl was born on Procida, the family was displeased. And I thought of the fate of women. As children, they seemed no uglier than boys, nor very different; but they had no hope of growing up to become a handsome, great hero. Their only hope was to become the wife of a hero: to serve him, to wear his name like a coat of arms, to be his undivided property, respected by all; and to bear a handsome son, resembling his father.”
― Elsa Morante, L'isola di Arturo
Why should you read it?
Discover an amazing author: Elsa Morante was born in Rome in 1912. Her work has won many different prizes and her novel La Storia (History) is included in the Bokklubben World Library List of 100 Best Books of All Time. I haven’t read her biography yet, but I’ve heard her life story is quite incredible. According to this New York Times article, Elena Ferrante chose her own pen name to make it rhyme with Elsa’s. Indeed, the name Elena Ferrante rhymes with Elsa Morante. If you’re going to read the book in English, make sure you get hold of the edition translated by Ann Goldstein.
If you’re after beautiful prose: I loved Morante’s relationship with words and use of language. I found her descriptions both fascinating and beautiful. I was impressed by her ability to put herself in the shoes of a boy and write from his point of view.
“All the great actions that enthralled me in books were carried out by men, never by women. Adventure, war, and glory were men’s privileges. Women, instead, were love; and books told stories of royal, splendid females. But I suspected that such women, and even that marvelous feeling love, were only an invention of books, not a reality. The perfect hero existed—I saw the proof in my father. But I knew no glorious women, sovereigns of love, like those in books. And so love, passion, that famous great fire, was perhaps a fantastic impossibility.”
― Elsa Morante, L'isola di Arturo
Links to buy the book
Always try to support your local bookshop. If you’d like me to add any bookshops to the list, let me know. Thanks to those who keep sharing new bookshops with me.
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Favourite quotes
//The purpose of this section is to share some of my favourite book bits, so you can come back to them when you finish a book, if you wish to do so. I’ve put in bold my favourite ones, in case you want to read a few (or all) ahead of the book.//
“The women, following ancient custom, live cloistered like nuns. Many of them still wear their hair coiled, shawls over their heads, long dresses, and, in winter, clogs over thick black cotton stockings; in summer some go barefoot.”
“In my natural happiness, I avoided all thoughts of death, as of an impossible figure with horrendous vices: hybrid, abstruse, full of evil and shame. But, at the same time, the more I hated death, the more fun I had and the more pleasure I got from attempting proofs of daring: in fact, I disliked any game that didn’t include the fascination of risk. And so I had grown up in that contradiction: loving valor, hating death. It may be, though, that it wasn’t a contradiction.”
“But, as I’ve already revealed, I didn’t believe in miracles or in occult powers, to which some people entrust their fate, the way shepherd girls entrust it to the witches or the fairies!”
“He never said a word about his life outside the island; and my imagination pined for that mysterious, fascinating existence, in which, naturally, he considered me unworthy to participate.”
“Wait till you grow up, to go with me. I had a thought of rebellion against the absoluteness of life, which condemned me to pass an endless Siberia of days and nights before taking me away from this bitter situation: of being a boy.”
“In my famous Code of Absolute Certainties no law concerned women and love, because I had no certainties (apart from maternal affection) with regard to women.”
“All the great actions that enthralled me in books were carried out by men, never by women. Adventure, war, and glory were men’s privileges. Women, instead, were love; and books told stories of royal, splendid females. But I suspected that such women, and even that marvelous feeling love, were only an invention of books, not a reality. The perfect hero existed—I saw the proof in my father. But I knew no glorious women, sovereigns of love, like those in books. And so love, passion, that famous great fire, was perhaps a fantastic impossibility.”
“When a girl was born on Procida, the family was displeased. And I thought of the fate of women. As children, they seemed no uglier than boys, nor very different; but they had no hope of growing up to become a handsome, great hero. Their only hope was to become the wife of a hero: to serve him, to wear his name like a coat of arms, to be his undivided property, respected by all; and to bear a handsome son, resembling his father.”
“The mother was someone who would have waited at home for my return, thinking of me day and night. She would have admired all my words, praised all my undertakings, and boasted of the superior beauty of a dark child, with black hair, of average height or maybe even less.”
“He had never known that one can suffer on account of another person.”
“Childhood, I thought, sighing, was always the cause of my bitter destiny.”
“Men like you, who have two different kinds of blood in their veins, never find peace or happiness: when they’re there, they want to be here, and as soon as they return here immediately want to flee. You’ll go from one place to another, as if you’d escaped from prison, or were in pursuit of someone; but in reality you’ll only be following the diverse fates that are mixed in your blood, because your blood is like a hybrid animal, a griffin, or a mermaid. And you’ll also find some company to your taste among the many people you’ll meet in the world; but, very often, you’ll be alone. A mixed-blood is seldom content in company: there’s always something that casts a shadow on him, but in reality it’s he who casts a shadow, like the thief and the treasure, which cast a shadow on one another.”
“So it seems that living souls can have two fates: some are born bees, and some are born roses. What does the swarm of bees do, with the queen? They go and steal honey from all the roses, to carry to the hive, to their rooms. And the rose? The rose has in itself its own honey: rose honey, the most adored, the most precious! The sweetest thing it loves it has already in itself: there’s no need to seek elsewhere. But sometimes the roses, those divine beings, sigh for solitude! The ignorant roses don’t understand their own mysteries.”
“It’s not true!” I retorted firmly. “Certain animals know how to be solitary, and they’re magnificent and proud, like heroes! The owl almost always perches alone, and the dugong comes out only at night; and the elephant sets off by itself and goes far away when it’s time to die!”
“Of course, the ones in command should do more good than others,” she agreed humbly, in a timid voice, “because if those at the top don’t set an example, how can this world continue?”
“The leaders of history, even the most famous, like Alexander the Great, weren’t fairy-tale people (fairy-tale people are mythical); they were people like other people, in every way, except in their thoughts! In order to be like them, and even better than them, you have first to keep in mind certain true great thoughts … and I know these thoughts!” “What thoughts …?” she asked intently. “Well,” I confided, after some hesitation, frowning, “the first thought, the most important of all, is this: One mustn’t care about death!”
“Maybe death was invented to balance too much boredom … eh? Arturo?”
“Until dinnertime, I didn’t move from my father’s room. I felt that I loved him even more than usual, and I was gripped, at the same time, by an anguish I’d never felt before, which, if I tried to translate it into words, I could perhaps put like this: despair at not knowing my fate. Ignorance of our fate, which is with us all at every moment, was always a cause of adventurous joy for me; but today my spirit oppressed me.”
“At that time, although I was good at thinking about ancient history, fate, and Absolute Certainties, I wasn’t used to looking into the depths of myself. Some problems were strangers to my imagination.”
“My fury, having no outlet, then became so painful that I began to moan angrily, like a wounded person. And certainly I thought that that bitter rage was provoked by the insult, not by something else; but it may be that, in my ignorance, I was already lamenting the impossible demands of my heart. And the opposing and intertwined jealousies, the many-sided passions, that were to mark my destiny.”
“Autumn was already upon us, with its early sunsets: the cruel moment of darkness came earlier every day, driving me away from the sea.”
“The cats, the birds, the beasts, too, when the time for a family arrives, are busy preparing their nests, like creatures preoccupied and inspired, without thinking of the one who commands them.”
“And, not knowing how to give expression to the capricious joy that invaded my heart, after a while I left that too-enchanting room. Until today, happiness had been a natural companion of my blood, which might not even be noticed, like a carnal sister. But today at certain moments I felt this new thing: the unexpected, almost unhoped-for presence of happiness, which burned my mind; and I felt I was embracing it, and I didn’t know how to distract myself with any other thought.”
“I felt grateful, but didn’t know to whom, I didn’t know whom to thank.”
“I say afraid because at the time I wouldn’t have known a truer word to describe my distress. Although I had read books and novels, even about love, I was really still a half-barbaric boy; and maybe, too, my heart, unknown to me, took advantage of my immaturity and ignorance, to protect me from the truth? If I think back now on my whole history with N., from the beginning, I learn that the heart, in its competition with conscience, is as capricious, shrewd, and imaginative as a master costume designer. To create its masks, it needs almost nothing; sometimes, to disguise things, it simply replaces one word with another … And in that bizarre game conscience wanders around like a stranger at a masked ball, amid the fumes of the wine.”
“The fact was that the return of summer that year was for me accompanied by what is called in good families the ungrateful age. I had never before felt myself so ugly: in my body, and in all that I did, I noticed a strange clumsiness, which began with my voice.”
“I would have liked to transform myself into a statue, in order not to feel anything.”
“Yet hope had by now nested in me like a parasite, unwilling to leave its nest.”
“The fact is that in general I was too in love with being in love: that was always my true passion!”
Important notes
For UK and US readers, Bookshop.org is a great option to support your local bookshop. You can read more about it here.
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