Arminuta

Even today, in a way, I’m still in that childhood summer: my soul ceaselessly spins and pulses around it, like an insect around a blinding light.

Elsa Morante, Lies and Sorcery

 

I MUST SAY, the epigraph immediately enthralled me. Donatella Di Pietranio’s novel, L’Arminuta (A Girl Returned), follows a narrator who shifts between her older self and memories of her younger self. This epigraph speaks to the narrator’s coming of age through her core memories. Even though these memories belong to her childhood, they continue to shape who she is as an adult.

Similar to previous novels we have read, such as Ernaux’s The Possession and Ferrante’s Days of Abandonment, there is an exploration of core memories and how they shape one’s current self. Hence Morannte’s epigraph at the beginning of the novel; it introduces the idea that the past never really leaves us. Certain memories stay with us and continue to influence how we understand ourselves and the world around us.

My initial thoughts on the novel were, what in the Judy Blume? In the Alice Munroe? I thought the novel would be a classic puberty story. Instead, we get a novel exploring kinship, memory, class division, and perception.

From the beginning, the narrator speculates about why she was returned to her biological family. After living a more lavish and luxurious lifestyle, she assumes there must be a serious reason behind her return. Adalgisa, the adoptive mother, must be sick. Or so the arminuta thinks. Throughout the novel, however, her perception begins to change. She learns that her mother, Adalgisa, has given her back to her biological family because she is having a child of her own with a different father than the carabiniere.

Many lifestyles are class markers. Language is a lightly touched upon; the arminuta asks Adriana to speak Italian when they visit the city.

Being returned creates a clear before and after in the arminuta’s life. It becomes one of her core memories. She is suddenly forced into a completely different lifestyle. She has to learn domestic chores and share a bed with her sister, Adriana. The life she once knew is completely different from the one she is now living.

I did not expect Vincenzo’s death, particularly given the scenes of incestuous affection between him and the arminuta. Maybe something would develop between them, I thought. His death caught me off guard, his life had given up, gave out. However, perhaps this was an important authorial choice to further develop the story and portray the different dynamics within the family. Vincenzo’s death allows for different dynamics within the family, particularly with “the mother” (biological) who falls into a mourning depression.

Overall, I think L’Arminuta is really about how childhood experiences stay with us and continue to shape our identities. The arminuta’s return to her biological family changes the way she understands family, class, and belonging. What initially feels like rejection eventually becomes an experience that gives her a different perspective on where she comes from. This connects back to Morante’s epigraph because, as an adult, the narrator is still emotionally connected to that period of her childhood. Her past continues to live within her and shape the person she becomes ♦

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Lastly, this novel strangely feels very Pedro Almodovar-coded, Parallel Mothers, of babies exchanged. Just as previous week’s Days of Abandonment‘s atmosphere felt much like an Almodovar piece, perhaps The Flower of My Secret.

 

These readings are very Durassian; fragmented, older-selves reflecting on younger selves *eye side emoji* let’s see how Thuy, clearly inspired by Duras, reads next week.

Question for the class: Do you think the arminuta’s return changed how she understood what family means? ♦