Miss Read's World

I'm reading A Peaceful Retirement, the last book of the Fairacre series of books, written by Miss Read. I've read the first two books in the series--Village School and Village Diary, and now the last two--Farewell to Fairacre and A Peaceful Retirement. Miss Read is the pen name for the author Dora Jessie Saint, who lived from 1913 to 2012, and who, like her character Miss Read, was a schoolteacher and headmistress for Fairacre School. The interesting thing is that the name Miss Read serves as both Saint's pen name and as the author's main character. Miss Read the author was married and had a child; Miss Read the schoolteacher is unmarried and firmly decided to remain that way, despite being pursued by two suitors. Since Saint was a schoolteacher herself, one can imagine that she drew on her school experiences when she wrote her books. Fairacre, a fictional village, depicts village life in all its glory and problems; gossip is what connects the townspeople and it spreads like wildfire despite the best efforts to contain it. If you are looking for anonymity, you won't find it in a small village, where everyone knows about the doings of everyone else. The books are dated; the first two are from 1955 and 1957, respectively, and the last two from 1993 and 1996, respectively). They depict an era when social media, smart phones, computers and the like did not exist. And when you read the books, you don't miss their absence. People managed their lives quite well (or not so well) for hundreds of years without being glued to their phones 24/7. 

I love Miss Read's world, like my mother before me. I especially like the last two books in the Fairacre series, and I probably should read the intervening books. Perhaps I will if I get the chance. But I've gotten a real chance to immerse myself in the Fairacre goings-on, and I've enjoyed them immensely. Miss Read the schoolteacher is a shrewd observer of human behavior and the books are peppered with her short reflections about life, love, marriage, spinsterhood (as the state of being unmarried was referred to back then), school, children, their parents, getting older, getting sick, and death. The nice thing is that she doesn't dwell morosely on any of the sadder events in life; she comments on them and moves on. The townspeople are closely connected to the land and to the seasons, and she comments on both as well. 

A Peaceful Retirement especially is filled with laugh-out-loud humorous situations and comments. Miss Read retires from school life after almost forty years of service, and many of the villagers have (well-meaning) advice on how she should use her free time. Her retirement starts off well but she has to learn to fight to preserve her free time. You can't get perturbed when reading about some of the village types; they exist everywhere and have done so at all times in history--the well-meaning busybodies, the complainers, the nitpickers and naggers, the doomsdayers, the drunkards, but also the truly caring people, the optimists, the ambitious people, the hard workers, the kind people, the churchgoers. I don't know if the books have ever been filmed, but they should have been. They would have been wonderfully entertaining. 

I'm very glad I stumbled upon these books after all these years. As I wrote about in a previous post from March of this year (A New Yorker in Oslo: Odds and ends and updates (paulamdeangelis.blogspot.com), my mother used to read these books when we were children in the 1960s and 70s. She seemed to truly enjoy them. So thanks are in order to Early Bird Books who send out daily emails with great deals on Kindle books; the Miss Read books have been among them. I have purchased a number of books in this way; some of the books are available for less than two dollars. You can't beat that price. 

A world of possibilities

At 93, Teaching Me About Possibility - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

Richard Morgan wrote this article for the Modern Love section of The New York Times. It was published on December 22, 2023. I ran across it today and found it to be a wonderfully-written and touching article about a middle-aged man living in New York who decides to really get to know his grandmother who lives in England. It is their story and he tells it beautifully. There are so many little points that are made that will stick with you, especially the points his grandmother makes. The importance of kindness is one. The importance of trying is another. Looking at the world as full of possibilities is yet another. A wise woman, his grandmother. You'll enjoy reading about them both. 

His grandmother tells him one thing during one of his visits:

“Age,” she told me once, “is just another bother attempting to convince you of the impossible in a world absolutely blooming with possibilities.” 

I absolutely love this. No matter how you interpret the definition of 'possibilities', and I know it's individual for each person, it is such a freeing statement, as statements coming from a place of love and kindness always are. Lovely, reminding me of a flourishing garden. It says that despite getting older, there are always possibilities for so many things--new travel adventures, new hobbies to pick up, new books to read (or write), new music to listen to, new people to meet. And so on. We don't stop living when we get older or old. Yes, there are more physical limitations, but one can still enjoy life to the fullest. It's about getting up every day and being grateful for another day of life. A day full of possibilities.  

Letting go of who people used to be--wise words from Heidi Priebe

I saw this online today and it resonated with me, despite the sadness contained therein. Whether it's growing old(er), becoming ill, becoming tired, wanting to give up--it is a blessing if those roads that people end up going down are shared with those they love, if those who love them want to join them on their journeys. That is not always the case for all. And it might be good to remember that we ourselves can let go of the people we used to be. Sometimes we hang onto them for dear life, thinking that we have to remain a certain way, when in truth we do not. Sometimes the people we were no longer serve us. We do not have to be accountable to the people we were in our twenties, thirties, forties, and so on. We can let go of them and be who we are in the present. Best to come to terms with who we were in order to embrace who we are now. Because now is all we have. 

To love someone long-term is to attend a thousand funerals of the people they used to be. The people they're too exhausted to be any longer. The people they grew out of, the people they never ended up growing into. We so badly want the people we love to get their spark back when it burns out, to become speedily found when they are lost.

But it is not our job to hold anyone accountable to the people they used to be. It is our job to travel with them between each version and to honor what emerges along the way. Sometimes it will be an even more luminescent flame. Sometimes it will be a flicker that temporarily floods the room with a perfect and necessary darkness. 

~Heidi Priebe (from her book: This Is Me Letting You Go)

A good article that resonated with me

If you read one good article today, make it this one: Opinion | How to be Human - The New York Times (nytimes.com)  David Brooks, the author, writes about 'illuminators and diminishers', describing them in some detail in his article The Essential Skills for Being Human.      

The world sorely needs more illuminators and fewer diminishers. It needs more good listeners, more nurturers, more doers, and fewer narcissists and incessant talkers who never get around to doing anything at all. It needs more coaches who build others up, and fewer complainers and naggers who wear others down. It needs more people who care about others in the best way possible. 

You know when you've been in the presence of an illuminator. You feel energized (re-energized), hopeful, encouraged, and seen (as in recognized for who you are--validated). You feel as though a warm light, a warm ray of sunshine, has shone down upon you. You also know when you've been in the presence of a diminisher, because you feel de-energized, pessimistic, fearful, and invisible. Darkness has replaced the warm sunshine, and a cold wind blows. Diminishers are narcissists first; if you are looking for any type of validation from them, you can forget it. Your self-esteem around a diminisher will suffer a lot, which can be very detrimental for some people. 

Diminishers are controlling types, the type of people who say the following: 

• I wouldn't do it that way.  (in other words, Do it my way)
• I would never do that. You're wasting your time.  (I wouldn't waste my time)
• You shouldn't do that or feel that way.  (I don't do that or feel that way)
• It will never work out.  (So why bother? Don't waste your time)

Diminishers are only happy when others are fearful, or remain in a place of fear. Illuminators want to lift those around them out of fear into a place of light and peace. Illuminators compliment and build others up. Diminishers do the opposite. When you are happy about something, they are more likely to try to burst your balloon rather than let you be happy. They'll find a way to do it, to needle you, to get under your skin, to try to control you, to try and make you feel bad about yourself and what you do. They are invested in trying to bring you down. They try to control your choices, and when they realize that they cannot, they will try to whittle you 'down to size' if they are in the presence of someone strong enough to stand up to them. Why do diminishers behave the way they do? They diminish others because they suffer from envy, from dissatisfaction with their own lives, and from low self esteem, even if it seems the opposite is true when they are always talking about how great their own lives are. They are really focused on the lives of others, gossiping about them, complaining about them, trying to control them, competing with them in an unhealthy way, because their own lives border on unhappy or miserable. Does that mean we should have empathy for diminishers? Yes. But it does not mean that we should sacrifice our peace of mind and soul for them. Illuminators do not require your obedience, loyalty, servitude, or submissiveness. They understand what real love is, and they practice it.

I have been blessed in my own life to know many illuminators; I have wonderful longtime friends whom I love and who love me. My husband has been an illuminator for me and many people he's worked with--a true coach. But I also have experienced diminishers, and trust me, before you understand who and what they are, you will feel diminished by them. Less than your usual self. Until you regain your strength, your energy, your true sense of self. No one can destroy you once you know who you truly are. And sometimes being your true self is a lonely road when you're surrounded by diminishers. But it's a far better road, and in the end, you'll have outpaced them and left them behind in the dust. 

Update on my book: A Town and A Valley--Growing Up in Tarrytown and the Hudson Valley

My book, A Town and A Valley--Growing Up in Tarrytown and the Hudson Valley, was purchased by the Warner Library in Tarrytown and can be found in the Local History section. I visited the library recently and was pleased to find out that my book had been loaned out, according to the desk librarian who told me where it was to be found. It has also been purchased by the Historical Society in Tarrytown, which makes me quite happy. I know that my parents and my brother are rooting for its success, as are a number of people from my past who have contacted me to tell me that they love the book. 

For those readers who would like to know more about the area of New York State where I was born and where I grew up, the book might be of interest to you. It can be purchased on Amazon: 

A Town and A Valley: Growing Up in Tarrytown and the Hudson Valley: De Angelis, Paula Mary: 9798842022946: Amazon.com: Books

and also on Barnes & Noble: 

A Town and A Valley: Growing Up in Tarrytown and the Hudson Valley by Paula Mary De Angelis, Paperback | Barnes & Noble® (barnesandnoble.com)

Goodreads Book Giveaway: The Gifts of a Garden

 The giveaway starts on April 28th!

Goodreads Book Giveaway

The Gifts of a Garden

by Paula Mary De Angelis

Giveaway ends May 05, 2023.

See the giveaway details at Goodreads.

Enter Giveaway

A book recommendation for my Norwegian readers

I just purchased the following book recently, as I was looking for a book that described the bridges over the Akerselva river (my second favorite river after the Hudson River). As luck would have it, a couple of Sundays ago my husband and I stopped to drink coffee at Hønsa Lovisas cafe, and while we were waiting to be served, we took a look at the books on the small bookstand near the entrance. Akerselvas Bruer og Fosser (Akerselva's Bridges and Waterfalls) by Kjell Egil Sterten was one of them. I'm happy to support anything to do with local history, be it in Tarrytown NY where I grew up, or in Oslo where I live now. The author is a local historian and lecturer who clearly loves Oslo. You can buy it from different online bookstores; here are the links: 

Akerselvas bruer og fosser by Sterten, Kjell Egil. 9788230333198. Innbundet - 2016 | Haugenbok

Akerselvas bruer og fosser | Kjell Egil Sterten | ARK Bokhandel

The Gifts of a Garden

A Town and A Valley: Growing Up in Tarrytown and the Hudson Valley

The year of pandemic living

I just finished Elizabeth Strout's new book, Lucy by the Sea, and found it to be a good read. The main character, Lucy Barton (a writer whose second husband recently died), finds herself riding out the pandemic in a rented house in Maine together with her ex-husband William, who has orchestrated the entire arrangement. He and she have remained friends after their divorce; he contacts her right before the pandemic hits bigtime to tell her that they need to leave Manhattan immediately. She acquiesces rather quickly, knowing that he is a scientist (parasitologist) and that he probably knows something she doesn't. The novel details their year together in a house by the sea, and how their relationship is rekindled after many years of living apart. William is now in his seventies and has major health problems, whereas Lucy appears to be in her late sixties and still relatively healthy, although she suffers from anxiety and the occasional panic attack. They are older and (presumably) wiser, dealing with regret and with the knowledge of their mortality. He is sorry for how he treated her (had affairs); she seems to be struggling with being alternatively judgmental and forgiving. In that sense, she is like all of us who have been hurt by someone--we want to forgive, we do forgive, but we wonder if we are being weak by doing so. We wonder if we should be hard and unforgiving. The novel deals frankly with the pandemic and the political events of the past several years. 

What struck me about the novel was the description of the loneliness that many Americans felt during the pandemic, as well as the panic and anxiety that many of them lived with each day. It was different here in Oslo; we underwent a similar type of lockdown, but I don't remember feeling that loneliness, the way Strout described it. It felt so empty, so desperate, so sad. And yet, I can only speak for myself. I know that the pandemic affected many people here in similar ways, especially those who lived alone. Perhaps that is what made the difference--having someone with whom to share lockdown. Because social life as we knew it ceased to exist. There were no get-togethers, parties, weddings and reunions were cancelled, bars and restaurants were closed, and people worked from home. I didn't find the latter bothering at all, in fact, I preferred it because I never felt lonely at home as I did at work. But again, everyone is different, and I can only speak for myself. 

Strout's book has gotten good reviews, but as always, I'm interested in the negative reviews as well. Those who are negative about the book are so because they did not want to read a pandemic book that reminded them of a horrible time. Additionally, they felt that very little happened to the main characters and that there really wasn't all that much to write about. While the former is true, I disagree that there wasn't really much to write about. The exploration of one's emotional life is not nothing. Lucy finally has the time to figure out how she feels about many things, and what she finds out is that life in general and her life in particular are complex, and that most of us live in the gray area between the black and white. In other words, while we would like life to be black and white, it is not. We are always struggling with our thoughts and emotions. But in the end, we are who we are and as we approach the last chapter of our lives, it is unlikely that there will be major personality changes. If you are the forgiving gentle type, you will most likely remain that way. If you are the aggressive unforgiving type or the philandering type, ditto. So that begs the question of whether she can trust William when he tells her at the end of the novel that he loves her. He seems to, and perhaps he always did, throughout his affairs and their divorce. The question, as her daughters remind her of, is whether she can trust William. The novel provides no answers to that question, and as Lucy herself points out, “It is a gift in this life that we do not know what awaits us.” How true. 

One of Many--my poem from Parables & Voices

Apropos my last post about doubt--I wrote this poem many years ago. The italicized paragraph describes a woman who has 'chosen' not to pursue her dreams because the man she is with cannot keep pace with her and is angry about that. My guess is that there are many women who do this to keep the men in their lives placated.  

One of Many (Portrait of a Lady) (apologies to Henry James)

 

In some future time she knew
In that way that only women can know
That regret would exact its pound of flesh
For all the choices cast aside, for all the roads not taken.
 
For there were so many roads down which
If she had gone, that life may have been brighter.
Not tinged by so many shadows, not clouded
By the sufferings of others that she took upon herself.
 
In some future time she knew
That she would look back at life
As an old woman and wonder why it was
She chose a man ahead of most everything else.
 
Was it love or perhaps hate that tightened the bond?
Was it fear that made it impossible to live a life unfettered?
Fear of loss, fear of the other, fear of aloneness.
But what is fear if not lack of trust (in oneself and in others).
 
The fierce desire to prove independence from others,
Has led to only this, that she cannot any longer
Act without him, cannot think, cannot be who it is she once was,
For better or for worse, without him looming there before her.
 
A kind of prison, forged by fear and lack of trust,
By uncertainty and a self-image which is negligible at best,
His and in the end it will be hers, chosen by her because it seemed
That if he could not advance then it was her duty to demote herself.
 
Once was pretty, once was lively, once was open.
Once was…..a long long time ago.
Now is diminished, now is careful, now is remote,
So as not to awaken the sleeping beast inside him.
 
For he smiles on the outside, but the inside
Is filled with hate for others and a desire
To be above them since he cannot control them.
He cannot be them, and she cannot be them, by extension.

(From Parables & Voices, copyright 2011, by Paula Mary De Angelis)

My new book, A Town and A Valley: Growing Up in Tarrytown and the Hudson Valley, is now published

This year has been a productive one for me so far. Since I retired last September, I've used my free time to garden and to write. I've published three books this year, all of which were years in the making. I finally finished and published my book about growing up in Tarrytown in New York State--A Town and A Valley: Growing Up in Tarrytown and the Hudson Valley. It is available on Amazon as a Kindle e-book:  Amazon.com: A Town and A Valley: Growing Up in Tarrytown and the Hudson Valley eBook : De Angelis , Paula Mary : Kindle Store                

A paperback version is forthcoming. 

The Gifts of a Garden

I finally received a hardcover copy of my book, The Gifts of a Garden, after ordering it on Amazon. I am very pleased with how the book looks; I love the cover (designed by photographer and graphic designer Paloma Ayala, and how the book looks generally. I'm proud of it. It is available for purchase on Amazon: The Gifts of a Garden: De Angelis, Paula Mary: 9798833097694: Amazon.com: Books

I need to create a Kindle version (e-book) of the book, which will then allow me to enter it in the Kindle Storyteller UK contest. I will also be sending the hardcover version to The Frankfurt International Book Fair, which is the world's largest trade fair for books. I will do this via The Combined Book Exhibit company, which will display the book for me at the fair. As their website (Print Book Display - Hardcover Copy of Book at Book Fairs (combinedbook.com) states: 

Showcase your paperback or hardcover book at any of our worldwide book fairs we attend. Combined Book Exhibit (CBE) participates in only the major book fairs around the world. Shows include the Frankfurt International Book Fair in Germany and Book Expo/BookCon in New York City, American Library Association and many others. CBE provides many options for authors looking to display their books without having to travel to the show. CBE displays books from large, small, or independent publishers as well as self-published authors.

Marketing a book that one has published is an important and necessary job. Without it, a book won't sell, and I want my book to sell. I have written a press release about it, have advertised it on my Facebook page Books by PM De Angelis, have written about it on my blog, and have informed friends and family by word-of-mouth. It's hard to know what else to do, except to keep on repeating what I've already done in the hope that it will stimulate sales. Time will tell. 

My new book, The Gifts of a Garden, is now published and available for purchase

My new book--The Gifts of a Garden, is now published and available for purchase on Amazon: The Gifts of a Garden: De Angelis, Paula Mary: 9798435180572: Amazon.com: Books

As the back cover of the book states--'gardening has become my passion and my form of meditation'. The text and photography in the book are my own. The book cover design (front and back) as well as the book's layout are the work of the talented graphic designer (and my friend) Paloma Ayala. I love the front cover design and I know you will too. You can find Paloma on Instagram at @paloma.photo.nature

The mind and imagination of Philip K Dick

Philip K Dick was an American science fiction writer whose life, despite being a short one (he was born in 1928 and died in 1982) was a prolific one in terms of his literary production--44 novels and about 121 short stories according to Wikipedia. A number of popular movies are based on his books/stories: Blade Runner (based on Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep), Minority Report, A Scanner Darkly, and Total Recall (based on We Can Remember It For You Wholesale). What struck me when I read about his life was how little money he earned as a sci-fi writer, since that type of literature was not considered mainstream. It was so unfair that he should have struggled in his lifetime to make money when after his death his stories were made into profitable films. He lived long enough to see only one of his books, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, approach the movie screen as Blade Runner; Dick backed Ridley Scott's vision for the film but died shortly before its release in 1982 (source Wikipedia).  But that is the inherent nature of an indifferent universe, which does not care a whit whether a writer (or anyone for that matter) succeeds or not.

I am currently reading Dick's novels and have finished Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep, Flow My Tears,The Policeman Said, and Ubik. I've purchased two more--A Scanner Darkly and The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch, as well as a collection of his short stories. Stanislaw Lem, who wrote Solaris (one of my favorite sci-fi novels and movies) was a big fan of Ubik. I've written about Solaris in another post: A New Yorker in Oslo: The Martian Chronicles and Solaris (paulamdeangelis.blogspot.com). While I was reading Ubik and Flow My Tears,The Policeman Said, I had the same sorts of feelings as I had while reading Solaris. The first feeling is that I was in the presence of genius, but an otherworldly genius. His imagination knows no (human) bounds. The second was that I had truly been transported to another world, that I was living in that world. It's almost as though both Dick and Lem really lived the experiences and worlds they wrote about. Perhaps they did, even if just in their own minds. I'm not sure how Lem lived his life, but it is well-documented as to how Dick lived his. He was a drug user for most of his life; his choice of drug was amphetamines and he wrote while under the influence of speed, but he also tried psychedelics. He apparently made several suicide attempts and was preoccupied with the topic of mental illness. His stories make you understand the profound possibilities for mind expansion, fragmentation of the mind and thereby fragmentation of one's reality. I can understand that this might hold appeal for certain writers interested in exploring alternate realities, the workings of the mind, and the nature of the world around us and of the universe. Dick wrote at a time (1960s and 70s) when America was undergoing an upheaval of all the norms of society up to that time. The Vietnam War had completely unsettled American society. Psychologists such as Timothy Leary (born around the same time as Dick) were proponents of the use of LSD to treat different mental illnesses as well as to foster mind expansion in the search for personal truth. Leary received a copy of Dick's The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch. Dick was also a fan of H.P. Lovecraft (another favorite author of mine) because Lovecraft managed to convey in his sci-fi horror stories the sense that his stories were real. I read a collection of Lovecraft's stories over a year ago, and they still haunt me to this day. His writing grabs a hold of you and won't let go. It gets under your skin. I feel the same way about Dick's writing. I can recommend this link if you'd like to read more about Dick's interest in Christianity after he had a terrifying vision of what he was told was the devil: When Philip K. Dick turned to Christianity | Salon.com. 

Although the Old Testament is not considered to be literally true, it nonetheless presents some interesting divine pronouncements, one of which is “And the Lord God commanded the man, 'You are free to eat from any tree in the garden; but you must not eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, for when you eat of it you will surely die". Adam and Eve were warned against doing this. The implication is that they did not really know evil up to that point; the Garden of Eden was heaven. But they were curious as to what might happen if they did eat the fruit from this tree, egged on by the devil in the shape of a snake. I have always interpreted this passage to mean that humans would face the divine and the anti-divine head-on with no filters and that would mean that they were dead. To do so while living would split their minds apart and probably kill them. Are psychedelic drugs the fruit that could be consumed in order to reach that knowledge? If humans reach it, do they face good or evil or both? What if they cannot handle it? What if it renders them insane? I think there is something to this, but I wouldn't go down that road myself to find the answers. The reason is that I've read and seen too many sci-fi/horror novels and films that deal with such themes. Best to leave them to the realm of fiction. Even though many of these books and films are unsettling and haunting, they provide themes for reflection, which is always a good thing. I'm looking forward to reading more of Dick's works. 

The International Review of Books' review of Survivable Losses

Survivable Losses is a newly-published collection of short stories on Amazon, that is well-worth checking out:   https://www.amazon.com/Survivable-Losses-Selected-Short-Stories-ebook/dp/B08MCRMYSR/ref=sr_1_12?dchild=1&qid=1605035612&refinements=p_27%3AStokes&s=digital-text&sr=1-12

The International Review of Books has written a timely and positive review of Survivable Losses that I wanted to share with you, and has awarded the book a Gold badge of achievement. 

Stokes left me with the uncanny feeling of looking deep into the character’s soul only to see my own reflection. The experience was like looking into a mirror, a mirror that, if I stood before it long enough, threatened to reveal things I hadn’t known were there. 

One is left with the sense of watching a mind travelling between planes of existence................

Stokes' work contains interesting and deep manifestations of the elements of the craft of writing: dimensional characters, a pleasing arc of tension, evocative language and thematic purpose.  

Survivable Losses--a collection of short stories

Check out this collection of short stories. You won't be disappointed. 

Survivable Losses  by Francesca Stokes 

Some reflections on C.S. Lewis

I finished Preparing for Easter by C.S. Lewis shortly after Easter, which is a book of his reflections on Christianity for each day of Lent. Lewis was a prolific writer of both children’s books and books for adults, and I was introduced to his adult books by my father, himself a prolific reader and a great fan of both Lewis and G.K. Chesterton (who wrote The Everlasting Man). Lewis was an atheist for a good portion of his life, but found his way to Christianity by reflection and reason. Or as he might have put it, he was pulled in that direction and at some point stopped resisting.

His writings appeal to me and others who have had questions about their faith, who haven’t accepted all aspects of our faith on ‘blind faith’ alone. Perhaps that makes us doubting Thomas-es, but I for one have a lot of compassion for doubting Thomas, who was a sceptic by nature. Yes, his faith was wanting when push came to shove, but life is often like that. I doubt that God loved him any less in the long run. Even Lewis suffered doubts about God’s existence when he lost his beloved wife Joy to cancer. Some of his best books come from that period and that experience; he wrote about pain, suffering, and grief in ways that you will remember long after you read his books. He never forgot to write about our humanity in our meetings with God. He understood as an academic that it was difficult to accept some of the tenets of Christian faith. So his mission was to write to help us understand them. I must admit that I use quite a bit of time to reflect upon his writings. But as he himself once said, ‘he reasoned his way to faith’. And for an atheist, that is perhaps the only way. When reason overpowers scepticism so totally, then there are no defences left to fight with.

Elena Ferrante's brilliant Neapolitan quadrilogy

I just finished reading Elena Ferrante’s Neapolitan quadrilogy, and I recommend it highly: My Brilliant Friend, The Story of a New Name, Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay, and The Story of the Lost Child. It would be hard for me to summarize her books adequately in this post, but the impressions they made on me will stay with me forever. Italian men, at least at the time when the author was young (1940s and 1950s), do not come off well at all, at least in the non-educated part of Italian society, specifically, Naples at that time. They beat their wives and children regularly; the women accepted it and the children became afraid of their fathers. Men raped their wives/forced them to have sex. Poverty was rampant, as was corruption. Many of the married men had lovers with whom they started new families while still married to the first wives. Homosexual men were beaten to death. Violence was a huge part of the society at that time.

Elena Ferrante is a pseudonym for the author of these powerful books. Given their subject matter, given the author’s desire for privacy, I think it is fitting that she wrote that way. Why do we need to know who she really was? The important thing is the books, the message, the freedom with which she wrote, not holding back about anything, really. She writes from a gut place; sometimes I got the feeling that the books just poured out of her. They are fiercely honest books, filled with events that are embarrassing, cringe-worthy, frightening, and horrific (the abuse that Lila endures, for example, at the hands of her first husband Stefano, and earlier, at the hands of her father). Elena and Lila are lifelong friends; their friendship is an odd one, not easily explained and not easy to read about. It is raw, honest, at times abusive (at least Lila’s behavior toward Elena), but there is a love there that is hard to define. They seem to need each other; Lila needs for Elena to become a successful writer (she does); Elena needs for Lila to break free of Naples and to reach her potential as the smart woman she is (it is unclear if she really manages that by the end of the series). But Lila is the person who Elena looks up to. Lila is by turns brash, aggressive, rude, mean, non-compliant, ambitious, passive, passive-aggressive, kind, loving, and then not—all over again. She is mercurial and beautiful—the type of woman that all men want, at least in Elena’s eyes. She is also fiercely intelligent, which Elena talks about often--but her ambition for higher education is thwarted by her family and her circumstances. Elena is also beautiful, but much less sure of herself, and certainly not mercurial and mean like Lila. 

All of us have known a Lila in our lives. They are the women who walk into a room, and it becomes quiet—all eyes on her. She is the woman that many other women fear, because she does not seem to need men in her life, even though there is always a man there. And the men fall for that type of woman because they think she will make no demands of them like most ordinary women, never realizing for a second that this is exactly the trap that Lila sets for men. She is the femme fatale who lures them in, and then uses them for all they are worth. Given her background of abuse at the hands of the men in her early life, it is perhaps no surprise that she behaves that way and that this is the type of woman she has become. Elena grows up differently; her father doesn’t directly abuse her, but he shows little interest in her. Her mother is emotionally abusive to her, and their relationship is strained for years. Elena is smart, and as luck would have it, her intelligence as a child is recognized by a teacher who essentially orders her parents to let her pursue higher education. Since there is no money for that in her family, the teacher helps her out with books and other materials, as does Lila when she first marries Stefano, who is wealthy. Elena always wonders why the teacher never did the same for Lila, whose parents also had no money. The difference was also that Elena’s parents, while resenting the teacher’s intrusion into their lives, obeyed her orders, whereas Lila’s parents would never have done so. So Lila was not as lucky as Elena when it came to being able to pursue an education. Lila tried for years to keep up with Elena, and Elena helps her by sharing her books with her, but Lila realizes that it is impossible to keep up, and because she cannot enjoy what Elena is enjoying, she rejects it utterly and begins to snipe at Elena’s progress and success. And so it goes for many years. Most of the Lila types in this life do not end up with happy and successful lives; rather they crash and burn in middle age when their beauty starts to fade, and they often end up friendless.

Elena and Lila’s friendship is a strange mixture of caring, not caring, jealousy, envy, ambition, thwarted ambition, fear, abuse, melancholy, bitterness, sometimes happiness, but most often confusion. Elena is never sure where she has Lila, and by the time she stops caring about exactly that and begins to live life on her own terms, she is in her late twenties. By that time, she has watched the married Lila seduce Nino, her first love, run off with him to live with him, and then watch as Nino leaves her behind and disappears. Lila’s life descends into a chaotic mess, but as time goes on, she achieves some sort of success; she lives in Naples with Enzo, the man who rescues her from Stefano, and with her son Gennaro (who is Stefano’s son). They learn about the computer world together, and start their own computer company. For a while, they earn good money. But as always, life steps in, tragedy hits, and the misery starts all over again.

Elena leaves Naples and marries Pietro, and they have two daughters together. She tries to keep writing after the success of her first novel that was published shortly before her marriage, but she struggles with her ambition and trying to find time for it all—writing and taking care of a husband and family. She struggles with confidence and lack of it, with confusion, with trying to understand the society and politics around her, and with trying to understand her relationship with Lila. She feels guilty, I think, for her success, certain that it is actually Lila's doing. She never seems to be able to accept that she is just as intelligent, if not more so, than Lila. Her intelligence includes being able to adapt to situations, to accept what she cannot change. Lila never learns that, and becomes brittle as she ages. Elena is by turns reflective and realistic. She understands that even though Pietro is an academic like she is, he does not support her academic endeavors, or perhaps more correctly stated—he does not think that her academic career is as important as his own. And then Nino reappears in her life, and her life descends into chaos. Suffice it to say that Nino is a destructive force in the lives of those he inserts himself into. Smart women, foolish choices. Lila and Elena are two women who fit that bill.

Elena Ferrante grew up in the 1940s and 1950s; we grew up in the 1960s and 1970s. By that time, roles had changed for men and women, or at least the expectations of what men and women would have as roles when they married. Feminism changed a lot of things, for better and for worse. Strangely enough, it never occurred to me when I was young that anyone would want to punish me or any other woman because we were intelligent, or try to stifle it, or try to dominate us and force us to pretend that we were not smart or that we would not use our intelligence. I understood later that there existed people—men and women—who wanted to do just that, out of envy and spite. Sometimes men were downright abusive to women who were intelligent and ambitious--the women who wanted a marriage based on equality and mutual respect. When I have spoken to priests and other adults about how women were often treated badly by husbands, some of them would say that women should ‘do their duty’ and submit to their husbands.  I once challenged a priest by asking him why women should ‘obey’ a man, as in “Wives, obey your husbands as you obey the Lord. The husband is the head of the wife, just as Christ is the head of the church people”, when so many men forgot the other saying—“Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it….” I got no answer, and that’s because there are very few men who love their wives as Christ loved the church. He knew that just as well as I did, but he couldn’t admit it.

Ferrante’s novels made me reflect on so many things, and those reflections have made me sad, as I knew they would, because they reopened personal wounds and touched on events that happened many years ago. But my life is so much richer for having read her books. When I look at our society now, there is perhaps less violence (there are laws against wife-beating and child abuse), but there is rampant use of pornography that has become increasingly violent against women. I don’t know what to make of society anymore, and I often ask if we really do want peace. I am looking for respect between the sexes, and I don’t see much of it. Even in the Catholic Church, there are huge problems when it comes to attitudes toward women. I think that the church needs a huge overhaul and that it needs to re-evaluate where it wants to go, because at present, it is no longer the moral force in the world that it used to be, and that people want it to be. I also think that it needs to clearly examine its attitudes toward women; it does defend them, yes, but it has a problem, like most of society, with highly-intelligent women. I have seen some very good marriages in my lifetime, but I would not define most as happy. Marriage works well if there is love there (including sexual love), but since no one can really define love properly, there is an element of luck in all of it. People can and do change over time, and become better people, and that will lead to happier marriages, but when I look at the pain caused by one party toward the other, when I look at all the unhappiness I have seen in marriages, I am surprised that the divorce rate isn’t higher than it is, at least in Westernized countries. Having said that, I think that marriages where both parties work (inside the home or outside of it) and respect each other’s abilities, where both have similar education and value systems, also when it comes to raising children, have a better chance of success than very traditional ones where the wife has been forced by a man, a society, a patriarchy, or a religion, to choose that traditional life, which often leads to frustration and unhappiness. Unfortunately, Catholic men are also quite unenlightened about many things concerning women, their wives/sisters/ mothers/daughters, and what women want, regardless of whether we are talking about Naples, Italy, southern Europe, Britain, or the United States. Ferrante’s novels work because she throws light on attitudes and behavior that most people would prefer stay in the shadows, in the dark. She throws open the doors and the windows and says, these are women’s lives and they are not easy lives. Pay attention.

A quote from Jackson Katz's book The Macho Paradox: Why Some Men Hurt Women and How All Men Can Help

I haven't read Jackson Katz's book The Macho Paradox: Why Some Men Hurt Women and How All Men Can Help, but I am impressed by this quote from his book. It's uncomfortable to read it, and yet, if you are a woman, you learn to do many of these things already when you are quite young. Here is the quote:

“I draw a line down the middle of a chalkboard, sketching a male symbol on one side and a female symbol on the other. Then I ask just the men: What steps do you guys take, on a daily basis, to prevent yourselves from being sexually assaulted? At first there is a kind of awkward silence as the men try to figure out if they've been asked a trick question. The silence gives way to a smattering of nervous laughter. Occasionally, a young guy will raise his hand and say, 'I stay out of prison.' This is typically followed by another moment of laughter, before someone finally raises his hand and soberly states, 'Nothing. I don't think about it.' Then I ask women the same question. What steps do you take on a daily basis to prevent yourselves from being sexually assaulted? Women throughout the audience immediately start raising their hands. As the men sit in stunned silence, the women recount safety precautions they take as part of their daily routine. Here are some of their answers: Hold my keys as a potential weapon. Look in the back seat of the car before getting in. Carry a cell phone. Don't go jogging at night. Lock all the windows when I sleep, even on hot summer nights. Be careful not to drink too much. Don't put my drink down and come back to it; make sure I see it being poured. Own a big dog. Carry Mace or pepper spray. Have an unlisted phone number. Have a man's voice on my answering machine. Park in well-lit areas. Don't use parking garages. Don't get on elevators with only one man, or with a group of men. Vary my route home from work. Watch what I wear. Don't use highway rest areas. Use a home alarm system. Don't wear headphones when jogging. Avoid forests or wooded areas, even in the daytime. Don't take a first-floor apartment. Go out in groups. Own a firearm. Meet men on first dates in public places. Make sure to have a car or cab fare. Don't make eye contact with men on the street. Make assertive eye contact with men on the street.”

― Jackson Katz, The Macho Paradox: Why Some Men Hurt Women and How All Men Can Help


I find it sad that we have come to this point in society, where women cannot really trust men to treat them respectfully. Where women cannot trust men to help them if they are threatened with sexual assault (when the men that could help just stand there and watch as their friends rape a woman). Where women are treated like objects for men's sexual (often violent) proclivities. Where 'no' is always taken as 'yes'. What has brought us to this point? Has hardcore porn played a role? I think it has. But of course that view is poo-pooed by so many people who want so desperately to be liberal in every way. I remember my father, whose view on men was not very promising, to say the least. He would always tell me that a lot of men were just no good and that I should watch out for myself. When I was young, I didn't want to believe that what he was saying was true. But as I got older, I understood. I have met many good men, but I have also met others who were simply the opposite--crude, rude, sexually-aggressive, violent, hate-filled, and envious. Men who think everything is a joke. Men who disrespect women by interrupting them constantly, belittling what they say, overpowering them by yelling, and so on. Men who become angry when told 'no'. Men who abuse women verbally (telling them they're stupid, for example), psychologically, and physically. The list goes on. So if Jackson Katz can teach men how to behave respectfully toward women, kudos to him. He deserves a star in my book.