The Story of a New Name

                                                                     

                                                                     

The Elena Ferrante quartet is making bigger and bigger impression on me. It is a compulsive reading. I read it at any free moment of my days and at times I even neglect things I should be doing instead of reading. I realized that my feelings about the book are ambivalent when my dentist seeing me appearing in his surgery with the book asked me what I am reading and how I like it.

My dentist is a great dentist and a very nice person. I heard many times that the dentists have the highest suicide rate. I do not know answers to questions: “in relations to whom?” or “what are the reasons for it?” I just assumed that it must be a boring, repetitive job, patients typically are afraid of them and it is difficult to build a rapport with people who can not speak during the visit. My dentist found the way around it. His routine, I have not seen changed for the last fifteen years, is to have a social ten minutes before he starts his professional job. He has wide interests and the good memory. I even look forward to the interaction at the beginning of the visit that is not particularly attractive even if my approach to dentists is perhaps atypically positive. The other day he asked the question which made me aware of my ambivalent feeling towards the book I am reading. My answer was “This is a quartet about life in Naples starting in the fifties and continuing for more than fifty years. Mainly about friendship. It reads very well, but I am not sure if it is a good book or just a trashy one.”

    

Naples is now on my bucket list

                                                                              

I am almost finished with the second book, The Story of a New Name, and I am just starting to think that it is a good book after all. Obviously not all really good books have to be heavy to read. It is a danger however that reading the book fast and with only short breaks I may miss points that are important. It is my job to stop from time to time and reflect a bit before new messages bombard me in following chapters. So, I have stopped reading this morning to reflect a bit on what I have read so far.

For me this is the book about a complicated friendship, needs for inspiration, about Naples and its Camorra, about growing out of one's neighbourhood, about bettering oneself, about the role of women in men’s life  and many other universal life dilemmas.

Since my knowledge about Camorra was almost not existent before I started to read the book, I had to look up the WikipediA and it said:

The Camorra is an Italian Mafia-type crime syndicate, or secret society, which arose in the region of Campania and its capital Naples. It is one of the oldest and largest criminal organizations in Italy, dating back to the 16th century. Unlike the pyramidal structure of the Sicilian Mafia, the Camorra's organizational structure is more horizontal than vertical. Consequently, individual Camorra clans act independently of each other, and are more prone to feuding among themselves.

I already found all of that confirmed in the book in a literary way. Even if mafia’s life is not the most important fascination for me, I was surprised to realize how natural it is for young men in Naples to get on the payroll of the organization and treat their involvement as a regular job. Sure the job requires sometimes sorting out problems of one’s bosses and do it with force and violence, but it does not have to be in conflict with commendable values that some members of Camorra may have.

Recruting and teaching 

                                        

Related to the role of Camorra of controlling business and money, there is one other aspect that made me think almost with some sort of envy, this is caring for people the organization or their members consider as belonging to their circle. They do not have to formally belong to the organization, but if they are in trouble, and this is almost always noticed, help comes from many sources. This resonates with me strongly as I have recognized some time ago that belonging is an important aspect of our lives. In comorric society one always belongs somewhere, want is or not. Some time ago I would consider that invasive. Private life should be just that – private. But reading the book I almost long for somebody watching over me with an intention to help when needed.  Some stories I am reading about are very appealing to me from this point of view. It seems that primitive societies offer their members more humanity than we receive in our sophisticated, well organized, highly developed ones.

Hmm, something to think about…

I got to my “800 words” (not coincidently, this is the name of a new Australian serial), so I stop here for today. My closing remark: if reading the book brought me to the subject of loneliness in modern societies, it must be a book of value after all.

My Brilliant Friend

                                        

I just finished the first part of Elena Ferrante Neapolitan quartet – My Brilliant Friend. I am dazzled and still a bit confused. This is now the time to sort out my thoughts and reflect on what the book really represents to me.  It moved me. At the same time I am aware of the fact that the books I have read lately moved me more than it was my experience in the past. And I always read. Maybe not that intensively in some years as now, but there was always a book in my briefcase and another one on my night table. There was a long time in my life I did not read novels or very few of them. This has suddenly changed. Maybe it happened under influence of a close friend, the husband of my best girlfriend and a teacher of literature? Whatever the reason, I really enjoy my new reading choices. After Karl Ove Knausgaard, Donna Tartt and A Little Life by Hanya Yanagihara it is time for Elena Ferrante and her four books about Naples and lives of two friends Elena and Lila. All of the books made a big impression on me and enriched my life considerably. I also found answers to many of existential questions especially reading A Little Life. I intend to re-read the book soon.

I read with equal to the current intensity during my gap year, I spent this time in Warsaw. I just moved there from a small town, the town I never liked or felt at home, to the big smoke where I did not have any friends from the start. While preparing for my entry exams to join the faculty of math I was wondering from time to time if I should not rather study literature, psychology or philosophy. At the end I made a practical choice to study math and even if it was not my calling it allowed me to find good and interesting jobs during my long career and do it with ease.

Looks like now again I am looking for ways to live my life more meaningfully and to reach peaceful contentment.  Hence, books play a special role in my life right now. I am looking for pointers. Ralf Waldo Emerson said that “other men are lenses through which we read our own minds” I would say that some books can play such role as well and I am counting that I will find some answers and ideas by reading.

Ferrante’s story tells us that the environment in which we grow up determines who we later become and how we live our lives. Scary thought, so looking at my own roots, I immediately found arguments that this does not apply to me. But even if I have strong arguments to support my view, there are moments I am not all that certain if I am right. I grew up in a town that I never liked and I had not become close to anyone during my childhood to reminisce with my early years. When I moved to Warsaw I did not turn back to recall the past years. Sometimes I think that my life started in Warsaw. There is at least one friendship from my Warsaw times that formed parts of me and is still important. Somebody said that Ferrante tells us “no self can be left behind” and that we can not escape our past. Hmm… Here I lose my conviction that I was able to fully escape the inheritance of the shabby, industrial, narrow-minded town I grew up in.

                                   

I can not argue with the Ferrante view that women identities are shaped by their men. That  sometimes their selves may be distorted or even destroyed by men they love. It happens that men are also formed by women, but this is not that prevailing and it is rather their mothers that impress their stamps of soul ownership not so much their beloved. Such is our earlier conditioning and traditions.  

I am aware that I have been strongly influenced by important men in my life. I was even formed by them to some extent. I must say that a lot of this influence was a good one, but I may have lost my identity for a number of years.

As I am waiting for the next two Ferrante books to be delivered by Book Depository, I will be thinking more about what My Brilliant Friend told me about myself and life in general. Ralf Waldo Emerson said that “other men are lenses through which we read our own minds” I would say that some books can play such a role as well. This is how I consider the book I have just read.

Love Child Finale

My taste in films and literature is eclectic. Isn’t it a lovely word “eclectic” to use when succumbing to not very refine pleasures? It brings intellectual legitimacy even to watching Neighbours. Which I do.

So, yesterday I watched the last part of the Love Child. I am not sure if it is the last part for this year or the last part altogether. The reflections that came to my mind watching the last scenes are based on the assumption that this was the real final. Dr. Joan Millar walks away from the man who she loved and maybe even loves still, but he had betrayed her. Her values do not allow getting over the situation and keeping loving him unconditionally. She is even miraculously pregnant with him after she had given up on becoming a mother due to some health problems. So, she could be happy with him, his little son and with to be born child of their own. But, no! She has values and she intends to honour them. I write about it ironically, but in fact, I respect her values and I also have lived by rather strict rules based on high expectations of others and myself. While there are times I feel good about myself having high ethical standards, looking at Joan walking away from a loving man towards loneliness I wonder if she is really doing a clever thing. I also question some of my earlier choices and categorical statements I had made. I recall one situation which I have been pondering on from time to time. It was a spirited discussion with one of my friends. I was not aware of the rules in her marriage and her husband’s philandering habits. I am not sure how the subject of faithfulness came about, but I remember expressing my views categorically. I was saying that the moment I found out about the infidelity of my husband, I would be walking out of the marriage. I can imagine how offensive that may have sounded to a person who had to forgive many times and turn a blind eye to her husband’s affairs. Had I known about her personal situation, I would not have said things I did, but I still would have the same beliefs. After this day, I was never again invited back to the couple who lived their life according to different rules than mine. Have I lost a friendship? Yes. Am I proud of myself and my high ethical standards? Not really. It may not have been even an issue of high standards…

                                   

So now that I am confronted with the situation of Dr. Joan Millar, I feel sorry for her and I am not sure she made a right choice. Maybe everything will be fixed if the series continues the next year? And they will live happily ever after?   Who knows what is the right way, I do not anymore.

                                                 

Character building holiday

I just came back from bridge holiday and I am still recovering. In fact, I am recovering from a cold as well as from psychological effects the holiday. Two recoveries wrapped in the same time period. No wonder I am struggling. The bridge holiday was my third experience of this type of the event and I must say again that this is not for a faint hearted especially if one is a beginner at bridge. I knew it was going to be challenging and I went anyway. Was I glutton for punishment? Maybe a bit, but in spite of some stress caused by my insufficient knowledge and novelty of the exercise I really enjoyed big parts of it. The people who organize the holiday are really very special people. Their bridge game is superior and this I find rather appropriate and I would not expect anything else from bridge directors. What I find impressive and surprising are their exceptional diplomatic skills. At bridge emotions fly high and there are plenty of opportunities for some exchanges to erupt into unpleasant situations, but this happens extremely seldom, at least this is my experience. This I attribute to calm, tactful and very sensitive approach of the directors who dissolve the fires not even acknowledging them as fires. Unemotionally, with a smile and kindness towards all involved.

                                                                         

The bridge room in Dormi House Moss Vale

Even if I considered the last event and in fact each one of them as rather traumatic, I am writing it with a smile on my face and that means that there were many good points in my experience as well. The first time I really did not know what to expect and quickly realized that I was out of place. Very much out of place. The people were kind and helpful though and I managed to go through four or five days packed with bridge games, lessons and clinics. I was scared, tired and I definitely did not know what I was doing there with all those clever bridge players who talked in the language I did not understand. Bridge language has many dialects called conventions and this is mainly a written language. The only conversation that is allowed in serious bridge company concerns alerts of unnatural bids. Except for that, one can say: “hello”, “thank you partner”, “thank you” and calling a director. I actually do not mind the shortness of conversation around the bridge table as there is so much to think about while bidding or playing that I am happy to concentrate only on that. One is supposed to be friendly and this means smile nicely at everyone around, not offend others by gloating, criticizing, instructing, offending. They are the general rules, as I understand them. The reality is a bit different. The room needs to be silenced from time to time as talks may get out of hand. Partners may get upset with each other game or game of their enemies and express their frustration. We are all human after all and bridge players can get emotional about the game.

I am told that it takes years and years to learn to play bridge well. There is a popular story told as an example of bridge realities and told to relatively inexperienced but ambitious players (maybe like myself?) to settle their expectations of themselves.

A lady proud of her progress and level of her game when asked how many years she has played, proudly and somewhat condescendingly answers:

     - I have played four years, dear.

And hears in reply:

- Oh, I have played eighty-four years, dear.

As I have been playing only two years after many years of the break following my student time bridge and I do not have eighty-two years of possibility to really catch up I need to dismiss the story and conclude that the second person must have been simply repeating the same year for many, many years.  

Remarkable lady 101-year-old on her way to the bridge room. She is the living proof of how true the story really is. She may not have been the best player in our group, but she displayed a really fighting spirit

Confused

Sometimes people ask me what my nationality is. Officially, I have the dual nationality and this is how it is also, on average, in my mind and heart. I say, on average, because there are periods I feel more Polish and there are such periods when I feel exclusively Australian. But, there are also times I feel confused about the subject and my own feelings. In such times I label myself – cosmopolitan or it would be more accurate to say - European. It also means - at times, I feel a bit confused about it. In my experience, the world is limited to Australia and Europe. The rest of the world I know from literature, films and news. Not even that much from geography as this was my weakest subject at school.  

I have seen recently two films made in Europe – Mustang and The Wait. It hit me how different the films are from the recently seen films made in the USA. The distinction that hit me is an apparent lack of action in the two films, especially in The Wait. Mustang is a Turkish film and The Wait – Italian/French with Juliette Binoche playing the main role.

I have also seen recently God Willing, an Italian comedy but it did not make much impression on me, but Mustang and The Wait did. They are two very different films, but, in my perception, there is a common denominator. I would say they both have the European flavour. I am afraid that I am not able to explain this distinction all that well, except to say that both of the films are slow in physical motion, but with deep running and action packed emotions. I need to decouple the two films as they are really very different.

                                   

I saw The Wait yesterday so it is very fresh in my mind. The film has contradicting reviews. Some very critical, ridiculing the film and some more kind and forgiving. My assessment is high – 8 out of 10. This is mainly for mastery of expressing emotions by Juliette Binoche; her face moving minimally while her body not even moving at all. My favourite scene from the film is the part  when a young woman dances a seductive dance with practically a stranger who  happens to be invited to a dinner.  The dinner is at the home of the mother of the girl’s boyfriend.  The two dancing young people are beautiful, their movements are beautiful and delicate, and they dance together but do not touch each other. They dance to the music of Miracles to Come by Leonard Cohen. The mother knows that her son is dead, she is watching the beautiful dancing youth thinking about her son and the girl, about of what could have been. She smiles… and then the reality hits and her face changes. This is a masterpiece of expressing deep and complex feelings with very little.

At the end of the film, I heard nervous giggles behind me. Somebody considered the film pathetic while I was deeply moved. How differently we can perceive things…

This is definitely not a film I would dare to recommend even if I loved it.  

Differently with Mustang even if it is a feministic film, I would recommend it without hesitation. The trick is to find an opportunity to see it as it is not the mainstream movie and will not be widely screened.

Five young orphaned sisters are brought up by loving, but conforming to village rules grandmother. The girls are bright, boisterous, beautiful and free-spirited. The youngest one Lale is like the title mustang. One can not put a harness on her, not for long, anyhow.  The girls need to get married and for that they need to conform to the rules. They need to be certified virgins, they need to dress in gloomily coloured, shapeless dresses, and they need to have typical, old fashioned women skills.  Future marriages are arranged by village elders.   I can see the wisdom of arranged marriages and have expressed it in my previous posts, but in Mustang this does not come across as a positive, loving choice made by more experienced but as an act of violence. The girls are literally imprisoned in the house of the grandmother with their uncle visiting the older ones in their bedrooms at night. They are waiting for being married off. This is apparently the rural Turkey of today. There is also a different life in Istanbul and other cities and there are people who think differently and yet such stories do happen in real life in Turkey.

                                      

One of my current bridge partners is Turkish and her name is also Lale. We seem to have a lot in common even if our backgrounds are so different. She actually recommended the film and I am glad that I have not missed it. When I reflect on the ability to meet people like Lale in my everyday situations, I feel very much Australian and grateful for the country accepting me as its own.