Goliarda Sapienza - The Art of Joy

‘Of course, and a communist as well.’

‘If he was a communist, then why did he leave the Party when the 20th Congress 119took place? What did he think, that a revolution is all sweetness and light? Uncle Jacopo didn’t drop out; on the contrary, he told me back then in Milan that it was time to fight harder, to stay in the Party and finally make Gramsci’s ideas heard … I know, I’m sorry, we’ve talked about it so many times and I’m being a pest. It’s just that it’s hard for us young people to understand. Take Nicola … Outwardly, in public, his father declares himself communist, then on Sunday he goes to Mass. And in the evening they say prayers. What a screw-up, as Nina says! I can’t talk to Nicola anymore, Mody. It’s awful, but I’m going to lose him! It’s like he’s deflated, worn out. One day his mind seems clear, the next day he starts saying it’s all hopeless. Did you know he only reads Indian texts now? I read the Autobiography of a Yogi too, to try and understand him, but all I found in it was the usual warmed-over mysticism. How can people not see that it’s just another opiate packaged in America? What can you do? At least it’s not found in our house, thanks in part to the wife your son really doesn’t deserve. She’s on the ball, all right! I don’t know how she slaves away all day looking after Papa and still keeps up on things. Such a sharp mind! I don’t understand how a woman like her can put up with your son, Nonna, I just don’t get it! You didn’t stand for it.’

‘It’s because Amalia lacks confidence in herself, Carluzzu. She doesn’t know it, but she lacks confidence because she’s a woman.’

‘You know, sometimes I enjoy teasing her. I cosy up to her and ask her to run away with me. She pretends to be indignant, and in a beautiful full voice says: “But Carlo, I’m your mother!” And I say: “No, Amalia, I’m Stella’s son.” “But I’m old.” And I: “Stella was old too when she had me with your husband.” At this point, she flushes and says: “How awful to tell carusi the truth, they take advantage of it!” And she laughs … those are the few times I see her laugh. I feel so sorry for her that sometimes I almost feel I love her. Is it true, Mody, that love is so very, very close to compassion? It’s partly for her that I got my law degree. I tell myself: “Now that you’re a lawyer, Carlo, your father will be mollified. He’ll give you money and you can go to Greece for three months before you get into uniform.” Instead, this morning he comes out with: “So then, beginning tomorrow you’ll come to court with me and start learning the ropes.” And I: “But Papa, in six months I have to leave for military service!” And he says: “No, no, we’ll get you an exemption.” Resorting to nature as evidence, I reply: “But Papa, at over six feet tall and with a chest this broad it will be impossible!” And him: “Everything is possible for a Brandiforti!” I lose my appetite, and on my plate I see battlefields, compulsory calls to arms, crusades, and I realize why wars break out … it’s one way to escape from home. But Judas Priest, Mody! How can he talk like that at his age? How can he say: “You’ll see the moral satisfaction you’ll get from having an innocent man absolved!” For every one you save, there are a hundred in the prisons … Doesn’t he understand that here, everything should be called into question, starting with his morals, which are at least a thousand years old?’

‘Carlo talked like you forty years ago.’

‘Carlo who?’

‘Bambolina’s father.’

‘Right, and he was killed. But they won’t kill me, Mody! They won’t kill us, thanks to you, and to Jacopo. I met his students up in Trento, young people with their eyes open, guys like me determined not to be seduced by any false idealism. It’s just that…’

‘What, Carluzzu?’

‘There are so few of us, Nonna, so few!’

‘It’s always been that way.’

‘And the few I’ve met, in Milan, in London, in Paris, are sad.’

‘It’s always been that way, Carlo.’

‘I don’t want to be sad like them.’

‘But there is still joy in knowing that you are different, Carluzzu, if you know how to find it.’

‘It’s true. That’s what they don’t want to understand! As if they were ashamed of being happy, as if happiness necessarily meant being like all the others: superficial and vain. Look at Uncle ’Ntoni, up there in Rome: a success with the public and with the critics, streams of intellectuals, of cultured people waiting to congratulate him in his dressing room. As soon as we’re alone, a tragic mask falls over his face!’

‘But ’Ntoni is a comic actor, Carlo. Don’t forget that.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘There’s also temperament. Don’t become fanatical about joy, for heaven’s sake! The temperament of a comic is terribly sad. There’s something mysterious, unfathomable in people, in the professions they choose. Nature itself is unfathomable, Carluzzu, for crying out loud! Let’s let others be the way they are, or how they want to be!’

‘You’re right, Nonna. I’m a fanatic like your Prando and before you get mad — I can see you’re getting angry — give me your hand. Peace! I’ll take you to see what a great bar they’ve opened near the Pescheria : all mirrors and glitter.’

Hand in hand we walked down to the port to take our minds off things, following the white wings of seagulls chasing lingering clouds.

‘Is it true, Mody, that if you occasionally let the mind wander, it opens its wings and glides over colours, sucking up their nectar as if it were a butterfly?’

The same thought at the same moment there along the quay in the shadow of the port. Can a sixty-year-old woman have the same thoughts as a young man of twenty? I look at him: in the last of the sun’s light, his dark eyes are veined with green and violet.

‘In the daytime your eyes are light, Carluzzu.’

‘Mama, I mean Stella, had dark eyes, didn’t she?’

‘Yes. Black as a starless night.’

‘Too bad I can’t remember her.’

‘I remember her for you, Carlo.’

Yes, a sixty-year-old woman can have the same thoughts as a boy of twenty. Still amazed, happy as a child, Modesta throws her arms around that boy’s neck and he takes her by the waist and lifts her, swinging her around among the fishermen, the stalls, the cries of the vendors. Carlo later told Nina and his friends that a few people turned around, surprised, but not indignant or scornful:

‘Imagine a serious, elegant lady who suddenly flies off the ground as if she had wings, hugging and kissing me! In a flash, the considerable conformist in me tells me: “Stop, or they’ll lynch you here, Carlo!” But the other Carlo quickly replies: “Coward, face up to them like she does. Better yet, reinforce her gesture by swinging her around, and let it be a lesson to you and to this stern, arrogant race from which you come.” My heart explodes as I make her go flying, and for interminable seconds I await a raspberry, some snide comment. Instead, not a word … And when I set her down and dare glance around, I see a few people almost fearfully avert their eyes, and one individual staring at me, transfixed by a sharp doubt that maybe, yes, maybe that odd couple is happy and has the courage to show it. It’s that old man from the port, the one as big as an armoire, with two shaggy little brushes for eyebrows. Well, after a moment that mountain of wrinkles smiles at me. It’s a victory!’

Nina laughs and is beautiful, perhaps more beautiful than before. She must be in love again. With whom? Maybe the tall, thin man who stares at her with the eyes of a music connoisseur who can listen effortlessly to the most complicated rhythms? Or is her new love Cesare, with his languid body and a face flashing with imagination? No, it must be the musician whom Nina is attracted to …