I begin Elena Ferrante's novels with a mixture of
fascination and dread. Fascination, because everything I've read by her has
gripped me. Her novels are riveting and her words flow on the pages, moving me
along and immersing me in her Italy, her Naples, and her family dramas that she
has carefully constructed. Dread, because I know that this immersion will stir
up the mud in my own life and memory; it will murky the waters that I think are
so clear, and yet when I dive deeper, I know they aren't.
How is it that one person, one writer, can speak to me and
to so many people at the same time? She has an uncanny way of getting right to
the core of what drives families apart and what keeps them together. She
describes the behaviors, utterances and dramas that comprise the push and pull
of family life, mostly without judging them, and that is where the fear comes
in. Because you know that the behaviors she writes about are real and often violent
to the spirit and body. Sometimes she judges them, but only within the contexts
of her characters, the ones who want to escape the oppression, claustrophobia,
and violence of family life. She allows them to judge, and we follow their
attempts to escape, which are seemingly successful, but we know that somewhere
down the line, the past will knock on their door and demand its due. At some
point, they will face the same situations that they ran from, and come face to
face with their early selves—the ones who said that they would never tolerate
this or that behavior, the ones who said that they would never behave like
their parents, aunts, uncles and grandparents. They experience the human
frailties, deceptions, betrayals, frustrations, rage, and even violence
(psychological and physical) that can be part of family life. The characters in
her books are flawed human beings, like we all are. Perhaps that is part of her
appeal. She explains some parts of our lives for us; I know she does that for
me. I finish her novels thinking, yes, that helps to explain this or that
family member’s behavior, or utterances, or bizarre points of view.
Everyone lies in Ferrante’s novels. Adults lie, but so do
children and teenagers. The Lying Life of
Adults is really the story of how teenagers become adults who lie to
themselves and to others. It is the story of how we become the adults we
profess to hate. Giovanna, the main character who is a teenager, is acutely aware
of the hypocritical behavior of the adults in her life. She has two friends she
confides in, Angela and Ida, the daughters of her parents’ friends Mariano and
Costanza. Her attempt to develop a relationship with her hated aunt Vittoria,
her father’s sister, has far-reaching repercussions for her parents, her
parents’ friends, involved children, and her own life. Vittoria is a destructive
force of nature. She is (presumably) the opposite of Giovanna’s educated, intellectual
and refined father, Andrea, who hates his coarse uneducated sister (the feeling
is mutual), and yet, that is what Ferrante wants to show us, that at their
core, both Vittoria and Andrea are the same. They are egotists and liars, they
think nothing of destroying others’ lives by wanting what they want (Vittoria
wanted Enzo--the husband of her friend Margherita, and Andrea wanted Costanza—the
wife of his friend Mariano). They justify their betrayals of spouses and
families and lie to themselves about how ‘noble’ their intentions are. Nella,
Andrea’s wife, is crushed by his betrayal and their eventual divorce, but tries
to live her life following the divorce as best she can. Mariano, who has
cheated on Costanza often, is also lost; eventually Nella and Mariano find each
other despite Nella’s protests to the contrary. Giovanna is witness to all of these
happenings. At the same time, she becomes friends with Vittoria (who worshipped
Enzo), Margherita, and Margherita’s children (Corrado, Tonino, and
Giuliana). Vittoria dominates Margherita and her children’s lives; she tells
them how to live and what to do and not to do. The relationship between
Vittoria and Margherita is strange and one I found hard to understand, but for
the purposes of the book, I accepted it. But I know very few people in real
life who would have become friends with their husbands’ mistresses.
Vittoria brought to the surface memories of my father’s eldest
sister Carmela, who was also not much-liked in my family. Unlike Vittoria, she
was considered to be good-looking; she was a refined woman with many intellectual
and cultural interests. But she was a drama queen, and no family gathering ever
ended pleasantly when she was present. She was unhappily married to one of my
father’s childhood friends, which didn’t help matters. My father probably felt
pressured to take sides, and he took his sister’s side against his friend. My
mother and my aunt did not get along at all; my mother found her domineering,
controlling, and nosy. Carmela and her husband eventually divorced; she lived
alone afterward until she died, but did have a lover whom she could have married
but chose not to. After one too many unpleasant family gatherings when we were
children, my father and mother decided not to see her anymore, and by
extension, we were not to see her either. After my father died, my sister and I
made an effort to re-establish contact with her. We found her to be a decent
person, but of course by that time she was old and in a different frame of
mind. I think she was happy to see us again, but our lives were busy and we
didn’t see her often. She died eight years after my father.
I could relate to those feelings that Ferrante describes—remaining
loyal to parents while wondering why we all couldn’t just get along, and feeling guilty for wanting to have some kind of relationship with my aunt. My aunt
made an effort to remember our birthdays with gifts and cards, but they were
never well-received, and eventually she ceased to make the effort. I remember
when my grandmother died, I was around twelve or so. Frustrations and anger
came to the surface, people said things they probably regretted, and the war
only intensified. It was difficult to deal with all those feelings as a child. But
I knew even then that this kind of family life was oppressive and
claustrophobic, and I wanted no part of it. And for the most part, I have
managed to escape it, but not without many mistakes and poor decisions of my
own before I got to a place in life with which I could be comfortable. Reading
Ferrante reminds me of my early family life, and it’s a mixed blessing, as I
wrote at the beginning of this post—I am fascinated by what she manages to stir
up in me, and fearful of it at the same time. Like a moth to the flame, as the
old saying goes. I know I will get burned. Unlike the moth, I survive being
burned, but it is a strange experience nonetheless.
