The Neapolitan Novels

92.

Today, as I write, I’m embarrassed at the way fortune continued to favor me. The book immediately aroused interest. Some were thrilled by the pleasure of reading it. Some praised the skill with which the protagonist was developed. Some talked about a brutal realism, some extolled my baroque imagination, some admired a female narrative that was gentle and embracing. In other words there were many positive judgments, but often in sharp contrast to one another, as if the reviewers hadn’t read the book that was in the bookstores but, rather, each had evoked a fantasy book fabricated from his own biases. On one thing, after the article in Panorama, they all agreed: the novel was absolutely different from the usual kind of writing about Naples.

When my copies arrived from the publisher, I was so happy that I decided to give one to Lila. I hadn’t given her my previous books, and I took it for granted that, at least for the moment, she wouldn’t even look at it. But I felt close to her, she was the only person I could truly rely on, and I wanted to show her my gratitude. She didn’t react well. Obviously that day she had a lot to do, and was involved in her usual aggressive way in the neighborhood conflicts over the forthcoming elections on June 26th. Or maybe something had annoyed her, I don’t know. The fact is that I gave her the book and she didn’t even look at it, she said I shouldn’t waste my copies.

I was disappointed. Enzo saved me from embarrassment. Give it to me, he said, I’ve never had a passion for reading, but I’ll save it for Tina, so when she grows up she’ll read it. And he wanted me to write a dedication to the child. I remember that I wrote with some uneasiness: For Tina, who will do better than all of us. Then I read the dedication aloud and Lila exclaimed: It doesn’t take much to do better than me, I hope she’ll do much more. Pointless words, with no motivation: I had written better than all of us and she had reduced it to better than me. Both Enzo and I dropped it. He put the book on a shelf among the computer manuals and we talked about the invitations I was receiving, the trips I would have to make.