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livingdebThe book: Ferrante, Elena. My Brilliant Friend (Book One: Childhood, Adolescence) (2012)
The country: The book was set in a small town on the edge of Naples, Italy.
Most interesting things I learned:
1) This small town just after World War II felt a lot like third-world countries today. The people were always dying of diseases and injuries. Only elementary school was required; after that you have to pass tests and pay to continue. Girls are not encouraged to go to school. Dads can be kind and caring and still beat up everyone in the family, especially if the men have been treated badly at work. Then the economy begins improving: "In other words, everything was quivering, arching upward as if to change its characteristics, not to be known by the accumulated hatreds, tensions, ugliness, but rather, to show a new face." Not that all third-world countries are full of hatreds and ugliness, but poverty (and often ethnic tensions) does sometimes lend itself to this kind of thing.
2) They usually spoke in "dialect," but also spoke Italian especially in school. Further research shows me the "dialect" they are talking about might be the Naples or Neapolitan language, a Romance language of the Italo-Dalmatian group spoken across much of southern Italy (Dalmatia = Croatia). "Italian and Neapolitan are of variable mutual comprehensibility, depending on factors that are both affective and linguistic. There are notable grammatical differences, such as Neapolitan having nouns in the neuter form and a unique plural formation as well as historical phonological developments, which often obscure the cognacy of lexical items." (all per Wikipedia, "Neapolitan language")
3) I read up a little more on Naples and finally realized that "Neapolitan" is an adjective for things from Naples (like pizza).
Review of My Brilliant Friend - This reads like literature and most reminds me of Anna Karenina, full of uncomfortable truths. The main character's friend sometimes inspires her to be better, but sometimes pushes her into jealousy that makes her worse. How people deal with pretty extreme wealth differences feels both realistic and alien to me. The highs and lows are exciting, but too realistic (so many kinds of lows) to be enough fun for me. This is the first book in a four-book series and also has been turned into a well-reviewed TV show, but I think I am done.
The country: The book was set in a small town on the edge of Naples, Italy.
Most interesting things I learned:
1) This small town just after World War II felt a lot like third-world countries today. The people were always dying of diseases and injuries. Only elementary school was required; after that you have to pass tests and pay to continue. Girls are not encouraged to go to school. Dads can be kind and caring and still beat up everyone in the family, especially if the men have been treated badly at work. Then the economy begins improving: "In other words, everything was quivering, arching upward as if to change its characteristics, not to be known by the accumulated hatreds, tensions, ugliness, but rather, to show a new face." Not that all third-world countries are full of hatreds and ugliness, but poverty (and often ethnic tensions) does sometimes lend itself to this kind of thing.
2) They usually spoke in "dialect," but also spoke Italian especially in school. Further research shows me the "dialect" they are talking about might be the Naples or Neapolitan language, a Romance language of the Italo-Dalmatian group spoken across much of southern Italy (Dalmatia = Croatia). "Italian and Neapolitan are of variable mutual comprehensibility, depending on factors that are both affective and linguistic. There are notable grammatical differences, such as Neapolitan having nouns in the neuter form and a unique plural formation as well as historical phonological developments, which often obscure the cognacy of lexical items." (all per Wikipedia, "Neapolitan language")
3) I read up a little more on Naples and finally realized that "Neapolitan" is an adjective for things from Naples (like pizza).
Review of My Brilliant Friend - This reads like literature and most reminds me of Anna Karenina, full of uncomfortable truths. The main character's friend sometimes inspires her to be better, but sometimes pushes her into jealousy that makes her worse. How people deal with pretty extreme wealth differences feels both realistic and alien to me. The highs and lows are exciting, but too realistic (so many kinds of lows) to be enough fun for me. This is the first book in a four-book series and also has been turned into a well-reviewed TV show, but I think I am done.