Elena Poniatowska - Leonora

She has letters to reply to and begs the Gallery to please do it for her. They see her so preoccupied that they agree. She takes part in L’aventure surreáliste autour d’André Bréton in Paris, and in 1986 publishes Pigeon Vole , short stories written in the course of the 1930s, collected into one volume for the first time. She paints The Magdalens under the influence of her readings in the apocryphal gospels of Mary Magdalen. Christ arises from his tomb, and Leonora’s Magdalen extends her hand to him, a stigmata on her palm. At her side, water and a giant fish symbolise Christianity.

Leonora suffers from alternating mental highs and lows, when she descends into a cave that is no longer her kitchen, but rather a black hole and a well of solitude. She repeatedly questions herself as to whether she wants to die in Mexico, and by way of consolation, imagines that death is a slow process of vaporisation, and every atom a different colour. Was it worth it to exchange the mansion at Hazelwood for a student attic in London and defy the world by going off hand in hand with Max? To bury her face in the mud of the asylum and set off for Mexico with Renato? To live exiled in a country that continues to disconcert and imprison her? She knows full well she would do it all over again, for she has taken risks ever since she was a child. Once when Winkie fell on top of her, Leonora, crushed against the floor, ordered her to get up off her: Winkie, stand up. ‘The higher the bar, the higher we’ll jump! I am a mare riding through the night. I am a nightmare! ’

Although she did not attend the opening at the Museo Nacional de Arte, Leonora exhibits together with ‘ Los Surrealistas en Mexico ’. She remains in New York to launch her exhibition at the Brewster Gallery. In 1988, she publishes The Seventh Horse and The House of Fear , a further collection of short stories.

In Richmond, she rises later than usual. She accompanies her son Pablo on whatever excursion he suggests. In the afternoon, she sits down in the park to read, smoke, and think about Baskerville, now back again in the kennels. When she and Pablo go to New York, they visit the Metropolitan and the Frick museums on 70th Street, for she is passionate to hear her son’s opinions, and pauses before each and every work of art, turning her head to observe his reaction, and to ask him: ‘What do you think?’ She neither informs or corrects, but simply listens to him.

‘And now it’s time for me to go and collect Baskerville, since they’ve told me he’s on the point of a nervous breakdown.’

She returns to the Kristine Mann bookshop, and greets Carl Hoffmann once more. At the sight of her, he almost falls off his ladder propped against a bookcase. What a pleasure!

They decide to go out to eat at the same restaurant. Leonora returns to the theme of her position as a woman.

‘I was born a female human animal and was told this makes me a woman. “Fall in love with a man and you’ll learn what it is to be a woman.” I fell in love several times without learning this lesson. “Have a baby, and you’ll see.” I gave birth to two babies to no better effect. Am I the observer, or am I observed by a multitude? Je pense, donc je suis. Ask Descartes.’

‘You shouldn’t be asking who you were, but who you are right now.’

‘It’s like Alice’s answer to the caterpillar: “I know who I WAS when I got up this morning, but I think I must have been changed several times since then.”’

‘Exactly …’

‘Because it’s true I am my thoughts, Carl, which means I could be anything: a bowl of chicken soup, a pair of scissors, a crocodile, a body or a leopard, even a mug of beer. If I am what I feel, then I am love and hatred, irritation, boredom and happiness, pride and humiliation, pain and madness.’

‘Pleasure.’

‘Before all else, I am my body and I yearn for an identity that demystifies me.’

Leonora has not talked so much in many years. Carl stares at her through his glasses, and considers she looks spectacular when she speaks with such passion.

‘That is why I try to keep myself to the facts. I am a female of the human species who is growing old. There is nothing particularly original or edifying in my saying this. My consolation is to imagine that I am a seed which may perhaps divide and germinate into something other than what it seems to be.’

‘Women like you are what restore my faith,’ Carl says with a smile.

‘How can you say such a thing? If you observe me attentively, you will see nothing but question marks.’

Leonora looks closely at him, face to face. Carl does not attempt to flatter her, he believes in her, and this is his way of acknowledging the privilege she is granting by talking about herself to him.

‘I’m afraid of death because no-one has so far explained it to me. There are many spaces inside me, and in one of them, right beside my dreams, is my return to Earth.’

Carl walks her back to her flat overlooking Gramercy Park:

‘Leonora, I have the key to this garden and we can walk there whenever you feel like it.’

LEONORA’S PAINTINGS ARE INCREASINGLY in demand and worth more by the day, all of which permits Leonora to acquire tastes which Chiki disapproves of.

She goes down to Richmond to visit Pablo, while Gaby attends a philosophy conference organised by the University of Virginia, and the mother and the two brothers are reunited.

‘Do you remember when you took us to the cinema called Las Américas to see three performances of the same film?’ asks Pablo, with a smile.

Her priority is her sons’ well-being. Even now they are men, she always returns to a familiar theme. ‘Did you eat all right today, Pablo?’ ‘How thin you are!’ ‘Cover up well against the cold, Gaby.’ ‘Don’t skip breakfast — it’s the most important meal of the day.’ Pablo gets back late from his hospital shifts, and his mother waits up for him, smoking furiously.

‘Ma, I am the doctor here, so please go and get some sleep. What on earth are you thinking?’

‘That no-one teaches us how to die.’

Back in Mexico again, the doorbell rings impertinently:

‘What a bloody nuisance! Whoever it is has absolutely no manners,’ responds Leonora with irritation.

‘It’s a young woman who says she is a fan of yours,’ announces Yolanda Gudino, the woman who takes care of her day and night.

‘How dare she? Tell her to go away.’

It is impossible to complete her sentence: the girl bursts into the hall like a whirlwind, throws herself upon her, and embraces her. The more Leonora struggles, the more she smothers her.

‘I am your greatest fan, I saw you at the University, I love you, I adore you, I idolise you, that means a lot, and I’ll never change my mind about you!’

After nearly cracking Leonora’s ribs, the girl sweeps her way in, overwhelming her. She creates air currents as she goes, accompanied by a cloud of perfume. Leonora attempts to detain her, but the young woman carries on. Yolanda observes the spectacle and the front door is still wide open.

‘Please leave now, your presence is upsetting the Señora …’

It has no effect, the young woman spins round.

‘The Señora does not receive visitors without prior warning, she is busy with …’

The carer is on the point of calling the police when her Señora regains enough strength to demand, in tones of high indignation:

‘How dare you?’

Her eyes flash with rage as she seizes, then wields, an imaginary riding crop. Authority emanates from every pore but before she can raise her arm, the girl shrieks: