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Monthly Archives: March 2024

Constant Comparisons (My Brilliant Friend)

I remember being very happy when I first saw the book on the list of readings for this class. For one, this is one of my favorite books as far as I could remember. I had read this entire series at an earlier time, when I was looking into book recommendations so I could learn how to illustrate compelling friendships in my own writing. The characters are genuinely written with a ton of nuance, and I really adored reading about how Lenù and Lila’s friendship developed from childhood and how much complexity it has. I also remember feeling completely lost when I got to the final page of the fourth book, because there were a lot of topics that Lenù had never quite resolved that I would have liked answers to. It felt like I was reading into the lives of actual people instead of an actual book I could relax with (especially since I could see myself and a close friend of mine in their roles).

There’s a lot I really want to say about this series as a whole… but we are only focusing on the first book of the series. If I had to keep that to two words, it would be: screw Nino. He did not deserve the relatively happy ending he got (I know that the book’s subreddit would agree with me as they love to heavily roast him).

On the subject of the first book, Lenù genuinely has amazing ambitions in life driven by the urge to compete with her friend, which resulted in a series of impressive moments and achievements for her that directed her character growth.

…Like that time when her brilliant friend taught herself to read and write at 7.

…Or that time when her brilliant friend was deemed to be the star student of the class by their elementary teacher.

…Or that time when her brilliant friend is deemed to be more physically attractive than she is in their adolescence and captured the attention of many guys.

…Or that time when her brilliant friend won an award for borrowing many books from a local library.

Those moments were all important to her, weren’t they?

At this rate, Lenù would never ever have to wear sunscreen in her life because of the shadow she thinks she lives in.

…Moving on.

Though I’ll have to give credit where it’s due. The constant competition between the two has pushed each other to be better in language, reading, and writing (which we can see when they chose to buy a copy of Little Women with Don Achille’s money instead of using it on dolls – as well as academically be the best in class. As they grow up together, they make sometimes unorthodox yet meaningful decisions driven by their desire to impress each other (such as the time when Lenù stoically throws Lila’s doll). It was interesting to note that they always felt second-best to each other since Lila envies Lenù’s chance for further education, and Lenù practically breathes for Lila’s praise. And it is ultimately hard to deny that their friendship proves to drive the major decisions in their life through competition and their strong dependence on each other. It’s just very unfortunate that their paths had to diverge due to financial situations on Lila’s end.

So what are your thoughts on the friendship between Lenù and Lila? Have you ever had a friendship like that?

What is Life without Death? (Death with Interruptions)

José Saramago’s “Death with Interruptions” has to be one of the most philosophical books I’ve ever read regarding the concept of death and its importance.

Now the book was split into two sections: with the first part exploring all the potential political, social, and economical consequences in society should death take a temporary holiday – and the second part detailing a personification of death itself as a beautiful woman who falls in love for a cellist who just doesn’t die.

Now, if no one died, their reaction would be joy, with people feeling like they have just escaped the biggest fear of their lives. If death was gone, wouldn’t that mean eternal paradise for people?

However, as the author describes, immortality is not equivalent to eternal youth. In other words, society would have many people suspended on the edge of dying, begging for their suffering to just end already.

It’s not just the funeral workers that are out of jobs – religion also becomes meaningless in their case since its greatest reward (eternal life) has already happened to everyone. Saramago also explains how this also practically ruins the economy (healthcare workers would be very overworked, for one) and brings about the maphia (a business that transports undying corpses outside of the country so they can die there since death hasn’t stopped working in literally every other part of the world).

After all the chaos that happens, death ends her social experiment and makes the choice to mail violet stationery to people who will die in a week so they can take the time to prepare themselves… which is an interesting idea. But would it really be any better for them? Regardless, it still imparts the message to society that death is absolutely necessary to life.

Ultimately, people fear death because they fear for what happens after it.

It is because we die that our lives have meaning in the first place.

When you think about it, you can not succeed at anything if there are infinitely more opportunities to succeed.

And you can never be happy if your life continues indefinitely without purpose.

Now, imagine no work of art was ever finished. Imagine that there are never any borders, boundaries, or frames to signal completion. Imagine that because nothing was ever final, that there are no places to hang up and admire completed work. Without the pressure from time making every color, word, or note a possibly final precious element of their masterpiece – the artist would never feel that creative spark or sense of urgency to tell the world of their vision that led to such beautiful pieces in the first place.

Personally, this is the importance of death I see in our existence. While Saramago in his book covers the societal disadvantages an absence of death impose, there are mental and individual factors that should also be acknowledged.

While I may not know the answer to what constitutes a “meaningful” life, I like to say that our limits to life creates a definition to what is beautiful. And to specify, one that is a completed beauty.

Death is permanent, but it is never without mercy or meaning.

So how would you define the meaning of death? What other consequences regarding the absence of death do you think would happen to society apart from reasons the author already listed?

Morals Against Money (Plata Quemada)

The first thought I literally had upon picking up this book was “hey. We’ve got the first coming of age novel in a long while!” Then I started reading Plata Quemada (written by Ricardo Piglia), and quickly realized that this has to be one of the most action-packed books I’ve ever read.

To summarize, this story starts with a bank robbery in Buenos Aires full of action and ends with a shootout between cocaine-fuelled bandits and hundreds of policemen in Uruguay. Oh, did I mention cocaine here? The robbers had taken the cocaine before and during the heist while gunning down bank tellers, guards, police, and innocent pedestrians before making their getaway. So this is already setting up for us to know that we are not looking from the perspective of an innocent human this time.

The language and writing is very dense and a little hard to understand at times, but it was very interesting to see how Brignone and Dorda’s relationship developed over time.
And yet, I found the characters easy to root for despite their questionable morals (especially since they are in love with each other and struggle with internalized homophobia). It was also worth noting that this had taken me back to my initial reading of “El Juguete Rabioso” (Arlt), which was an earlier reading done many weeks ago at this point. The viewpoint character was also morally grey considering his involvement in thievery and jaded experiences while growing up.

Upon becoming aware of the fact that the plot was based off of a crime that actually happened in real life, I remember immediately immediately going into a deep rabbit hole online reading articles that talked about the robbery this book was inspired by.

The point where the robbers start burning the money also stood out to me, since this is the point where they believed if they can’t keep the money, then no one can. This causes the crowd’s opinion to completely turn against them, unwilling to watch the prospect of thousands of dollars being destroyed right before their very eyes. If the money was the sole reason for all the murders they had done, and if the money they did the murders for was burning in front of them, then the characters had to be viewed as completely unredeemable.

Yet, the concept of money is neutral in all of this. Its symbolism only depends on how it’s utilized in the first place.

…When did we as a society start prioritizing money over the value of a human life? And what should truly be held more in value: money or morals? And how do you interpret the meaning of money in this novel?

Why did I subject myself to this. (The Lover)

I like to say that I have read plenty of horrible romance stories in my lifetime, and have seen plenty of interesting (read: “disturbing”) tropes regarding relationships in the process. So when I received a content warning regarding this book, I simply brushed it aside thinking that it wouldn’t be too bad on my end.

For reference, I have survived reading the Twilight series, “After Forever”, briefly looking over the accursed, satirical coronavirus romance trilogy, and having to glimpse over more unhinged premises of books I would love to unread.

Admittedly, “The Lover” (Marguerite Duras) isn’t as bad as the examples I had listed above. But it still has some elements that some people would not be okay with as a plot point (namely a romantic relationship between 2 people with very different ages).

So imagine if Lolita was autobiographical and was written from the perspective of the titular character.

That’s pretty much the premise of this book.

But while both relationships are absolutely inappropriate, but a girl in her mid-teens (and especially when it is told through her perspective) is going to be read a lot differently compared to a book written through the predator’s perspective about a pre-teen girl.

And in the case of Duras’s novel, she at least desires her rich Chinese partner, she has some agency in what is happening, even though her hand is forced by the abuse in her family (which is such a typical unfortunate situation in real life as well — to simply swap one form of abuse for another). So her relationship is also a story of abuse.

Duras makes it clear that as a young girl, she felt forced by necessity to become involved with an older man in order to survive based on several factors. Her family was incredibly poor. Her mentally unsound mother forbade the relationship. But the lover was generous, and their family desperately needed the money. Then, she screams at her daughter and beat her (with the lover being a way to escape her pain).

This is not just an average love story, or an average story about the tragedies of poverty, or a story about how the loved ones in her life mistreated her. She just wants to write down what happened and make peace with it. The result is something that is unexpectedly beautiful and meaningful.

After all, there’s genuinely nothing wrong with a person recounting their truth in light of their experiences.

What exactly does it mean to love a person? Do you think it is true romantic love if one gets into a relationship based on a financial necessity?

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