Corso di Laurea magistrale in
Lingue e Letterature Europee, Americane e
Postcoloniali.
Tesi di Laurea
Fay Weldon’s Four Tales of Love and Marriage
An Introduction and a Translation.
Relatore
Ch. Prof. Silvana Cattaneo
Correlatore
Ch. Prof. Michela Vanon
Laureanda
Valentina Maso
Matricola: 814657
Anno Accademico
2011 / 2012
Table of Contents
1.
INTRODUCTION
1.1 Fay Weldon
1.2 Fay Weldon’s Work
1.3 Wicked Women (1996)
2.
THE FOUR SHORT STORIES:
2.1
Introduction to Run and Ask Daddy If He Has Any More Money
2.2
Corri a chiedere a papà se ha altri soldi
2.3
Introduction to Pains
2.4
Dolore
2.5
Introduction to A Good Sound Marriage
2.6
Un matrimonio davvero solido
2.7
Introduction to In The Great War (II)
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1. INTRODUCTION
1.1 Fay Weldon
Fay Weldon is one of the most prolific English contemporary authors of internationally acclaimed fictional novels and short stories, screen plays, and television and radio dramas, as well as works of biography and historical criticism. Because of fact that she has always showed sympathy with the female universe, she has been called a feminist; it is known that she has frequently rejected that epithet. What is certain is that she is one of the most unconventional contemporary writers dealing with women and telling their stories from a female point of view, using an ironic, witty style. The gift for writing seems to be an inherited quality; her mother, Margaret Birkinshaw, published two novels under her maiden name and wrote serial novels under the pseudonym Pearl Bellairs. Her maternal grandfather, Edgar Jepson, edited
Vanity Fair and wrote popular romance-adventure stories, and his brother
Selwyn authored mystery-thrillers and plays for television and radio.
Fay Weldon was conceived in New Zealand and born in England, in 1931. When she was five weeks old, her family returned to New Zealand. Her original name is Franklin Birkinshaw, her mother believing that it was an appropriate female diminutive of her husband Frank’s name. The name Franklin was ambiguous. Their parents wanted a boy and she used to feel as if she had failed
to make them happy1. Frank Thornton Birkinshaw was a doctor. He and his wife divorced when Weldon was five years old and then he walked off into the mist2 and his daughters never saw him again. From that point of her life onwards, she grew up surrounded by women and believing that the world was peopled by
females3, a belief which is reflected in her literary work. When the war ended and Weldon was about fourteen, she returned to England with her mother and sister to live with her grandmother. In London, Weldon attended a convent
1 Weldon, Fay. Auto Da Fay: A Memoir, Flamingo (HarperCollins), 2002, London, p.13. 2 Ibidem, p.17.
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school. After graduating, she entered university in Scotland and graduated in economics and psychology.
In her early twenties, she was briefly married to a schoolmaster more than twenty years older, the father of her first son, whom she raised as a single mother.
She started a professional career as a successful advertising copywriter and in 1962, she married Ron Weldon and had three more sons. In the meantime, she had started writing. Her first novel, The Fat Woman's Joke (1967), was published in 1967, but by then she had already written about fifty plays for radio, stage, or television. The most successful was her adaptation of Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice. In addition, her brilliant novel The Life and
Loves of a She-Devil (1983), published in 1983, was serialized on BBC and
made into a popular film in the United States. She has published nearly 30
novels, collections of short stories, television films, newspapers and magazine articles.
After a thirty-year marriage, she and Ron divorced in 1994. Later, she married Nick Fox, a poet, while her writing and career continued to flourish. In 2006 Weldon was appointed Professor of Creative Writing at Brunel University, London. Today, she lives in Dorset with her husband4.
1.2 Fay Weldon’s Work
Fay Weldon’s personal story has had great influence on her work. Many events of her life inspired some of her best novels and short stories. Living with her mother and sister, attending educational institutions for girls and surrounded almost exclusively by them, it is easy to see why the main characters of her fiction belong to the female world. However, the few male figures that she met in her life were of paramount importance in her personal development. Particularly, Frank Birkinshaw was the first patriarchal figure who challenged her womanhood. Her difficult relationship with him scarred her for life. As her
4 Weldon’s biography is taken from the following websites:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2002/may/18/biography.fayweldon, http://redmood.com/weldon/biography.html, and http://www.bookrags.com/biography/fay-birkinshaw-weldon/
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autobiography Auto da Fay (2002) tells us, Frank Birkinshaw abandoned his family for the first time few months before Fay’s birth. He left them alone in New Zealand, immediately after an earthquake. However, a little later, he came back home. One day, Weldon’s mother, tired of her husband’s continuous affairs, committed adultery. So Frank divorced from her and disappeared. It is no accident that plenty of Weldon’s stories are about adulterous husbands who, under the pretext of being betrayed, seize the opportunity to leave their wives, or, perhaps even worse, deliberately continue to be unfaithful to them. Fay did not know about her parents’ divorce and she went on hoping that her father would return. He once visited her at the convent school where she was educated, but then he left her again, reappearing only in the summer holidays. When Fay learnt that her parents had divorced, her relationship with her father drastically changed and she never saw him again. The trauma connected with that loss affected her adult life and is implicitly reflected in much of her literary work – the symbol of the empty bed is a constant refrain through many of her stories. When her first marriage failed, Weldon came to terms with bringing up a child without the support of a husband and experienced loneliness again. She was shocked when she discovered that her first husband had married her for convenience, she and her small son being a replacement for an errant wife and child whose absence threatened to make his job applications unconvincing5. Also the relationship with Weldon’s second husband was not an easy one. She went through a mid-life crisis and put on weight – a personal event that gave material for The Fat Woman's Joke (1967) (the story of a marriage that collapses when husband and wife decide to go on a diet) and turned to psychoanalysis, an event that inspired her novel Affliction (1993) (the story of a marriage that collapses under the weight of psychoanalysis) and gave her the self-knowledge and courage to give up advertising and start writing6. Since the beginning, throughout all her career, her work has always pursued themes strictly related to the most important episodes of her life. Her writing style while dealing with them has not much varied. It has always been very personal
5 http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2002/may/18/biography.fayweldon 6
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and assertive. Sentences are usually concise and short which give the narration a fast rhythm able to capture the reader’s attention and make him curious about what is going to happen. Little importance is given to unnecessary descriptions; this does not mean, however, that she pays little attention to details; for example, she gives great importance to her character’s passions, instincts, and feelings. The notions acquired from her academic studies in psychology gives further credibility to the analysis of her characters. In fact, the narrator’s presence is strong and frequently gives personal commentaries and, sometimes, ethical judgements. Much space is also given to symbolism and metaphors. However, the most distinctive feature of Weldon’s style is witty humour. Although Weldon writes about painful, often tragic realities, irony is the literary device she most often uses to present them. It pervades the entire of her work. It is a way of seeing things, a method that she uses in order to keep life events at a distance. Sometimes, this can be quite disturbing, especially in tragic stories. This is the narrative of Black Comedy7, which has a long tradition in British fiction and Weldon has often been compared to her predecessors Evelyn Waugh and Muriel Spark8.
Fay Weldon’s work has always borne witness to the family values and sexual morality of the English middle class in order to unmask its social conventions. Quite a few of her characters are affluent people, sometimes famous, vain and whimsical, dominated by greed and lust for power. The author focuses on one particular kind of power – that of love and sex – and shows its disruptive force by underlining the harm caused by people who wield it. Over the latest decades, from the feminist rage of the 1960s to the social criticism of the 2000s, the heart of Weldon’s matter is the same: the devastating power of love and sex within a
7 The term black humor was coined by the Surrealist theoretician André Breton in 1935 to designate a sub-genre of
comedy and satire in which laughter arises from cynicism and skepticism, often relying on topics such as death. Breton credited Jonathan Swift as the originator of black humor and gallows humor. Black humor is related to that of the grotesque genre. In black humor, topics and events that are usually regarded as taboo, specifically those related to death, are treated in an unusually humorous or satirical manner while retaining their seriousness; the intent of black comedy, therefore, is often for the audience to experience both laughter and discomfort, sometimes simultaneously.
8http://books.google.it/books?id=RKkxuhw7kowC&pg=PA350&lpg=PA350&dq=weldon+life+influenced+her+work&
source=bl&ots=pYlsdoAxL3&sig=GK_tqzoSbRnRs6TETiOAQlntcf8&hl=it&sa=X&ei=92SZT_7VHsWl4gSY9oDFB g&ved=0CCMQ6AEwAA#v=onepage&q&f=false
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patriarchal society which wants appearances safe and lives in hypocrisy. Weldon’s stories concentrate on the everyday battle fought by characters using their sexual power to gain control over someone else. They face issues such as adultery, which leads to fight for love, revenge, death and rebirth9. Having started her career as a writer during the years of the feminist struggle, in the 1960s, she seems to side with women in their deliberate attack against men’s behaviour. However, the reader will soon find that women are not entirely free from blame. Weldon’s attitude towards womanhood is often ambiguous. They are frequently portrayed as envious, feeble and lecherous, therefore deserving what they get. The author lays women’s weaknesses bare inside a grey, middle class existence full of stereotypes and hypocrisy10. In an interview carried out for Bomb magazine in 1990, the interviewer asked her if she considers herself a feminist. She replied:
It depends on the society. In anti-feminist societies, I come out very feminist. In feminist societies, I come out just a little reactionary. Traditional woman. I’m married and have three sons, you see. I don’t do what I ought. I don’t write the books I ought. I don’t present women as heroines particularly. They’re simply central to what I write which makes them appear as if they must be feminist, because it’s out of the old tradition in which men were central11.
Undoubtedly, Weldon’s 1960s books depicted the society of the time in which they were written: women became aware of their position and started to rebel against male authority. However, chauvinism was deeply rooted and it was hard to fight against it. The result was that someone protested and others continued to be the victims of the patriarchal system. Women’s frustration appears in diverse ways, paranoia, obsession, insanity, persecution, cruelty, revenge, destruction, annihilation. Women are portrayed in a complex way, in a variety of different behaviours while men tend to be given only two connotations. One is wickedness: in Affliction (1993) Spicer, the protagonist’s husband is a
9 Such themes will be analysed in the second chapter.
10 http://www.ecologiasociale.org/pg/dum_fem_weldon2.html 11
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bastard, a “monster”12 who ruins their marriage, a disgusting man who brainwashes his wife and, as a consequence, she loses their baby; in Worst
Fears (1995) Ned, suspecting that his wife is betraying him, embarks on a
series of adulterous relationships and excludes her from his will, making her homeless; in Female Friends (1975), arrogant Oliver repeatedly humiliates her wife Chloe who sacrificed everything to her marriage and children. The other is cowardice. Adulterous husbands rarely divorce their wives, they prefer going on cheating and lying. However, Weldon’s books do not only talk about the war between men and women. Another clash, even more powerful is that of women against women. Although feminists used to be behind each other to form a solid alliance against a common enemy – man – the reality of women’s everyday life was more complex. Imprisoned in a society in which men’s immoral behaviours were legitimized, wives inevitably hated their husbands’ mistresses, and vice versa. Weldon’s women fight, instead of supporting each other. This is the author’s opinion:
Women are rivals. That’s not their fault. Nature wants them to compete in order to provide their children for the best genes. The feminist concept of ‘sisterhood’ was in vogue when women were against a common enemy. They won their battle but they lost their respect for men. So, today they do not care about them and vie with each other […] who’s the thinner? The cleverer? The younger13?
The author has written many stories of female rivalry. Her best one is The Life
and Loves of a She-Devil (1983) in which Ruth’s envy towards her husband’s
mistress is so great that she goes after a bloody revenge against her. Another example of vengeance caused by women’s rivalry is given by The Bulgari
Connection (2001), in which the main character hits rock bottom and goes to
jail for having tried to murder her husband’s new partner. In addition, female friendships are usually rather complicated – in Female Friends (1975) Chloe, Marjorie and Grace are both friends and adversaries. Since they were
12
Wedon, Fay. Affliction, Harper Collins, 1993, London, p.49. 13
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schoolmates, they have loved and hated each other, being torn apart by the men they loved14 – or hypocritical and superficial. Plenty of examples shows this tendency. Female friendships are easily betrayed and some women have it off with their best friend’s husbands. In Affliction (1993), Annette’s best friend and confidante admits that she betrayed both her husband and best friend. Indeed, all kinds of relationship in Weldon’s reality seem to lack depth. That can be seen in The Fat Woman’s Joke (1967), when Esther’s son frivolously embarks on a sexual relationship with his father’s lover. The characters are extremely self-centred and they do not seem to attach importance to mutual respect. In particular, if some women are not always to blame, almost all male characters are pilloried by the author’s judgement and depicted as vile, unfeeling cowards. On the subject, she says:
On the whole, that is how I portray men. This is not necessarily how I see men. I simply can’t help doing it on the page […] I don’t think that men are worse than women or women are worse than men at all. I think they find themselves in different situations because society pushes them one way or another and it is much, much easier for men to behave badly and everyone behaves as badly as they can get away with.
And adds a funny comment:
I do get a lot of men coming up to me blaming me for their divorces. It’s quite extraordinary. Of people that I know, if they get divorced, the men blame me. I get worried by this. So for consolation, I looked at the Soviet Union where there are 290 million people with a fifty percent divorce rate and none of them have read me. So I think people manage this sort of destruction of their private lives without any help from me.
As just stated, Weldon’s men are undeniably destined to go to hell without any possibility of forgiveness, but this does not mean that their betrayed, deserted wives should not follow them there15. In addition, it is often true that men are not always the first one in the couple who commits adultery. This is the case for
14 Weldon, Fay. Female Friends, William Heinemann, 1975, London, back cover. 15
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many of her novels. Carl May, from The Cloning of Johanna May (1989), discovers her wife in his art gallery having sex with another man and decides to kill him; betrayed Annette from Affliction (1993) is the first to start the ‘adultery saga’ of her marriage by having an affair with her manager; the ‘serial-betrayer’ Ned from Worst Fears (1995) begins his adulterous activity only after discovering that his beautiful wife Alexandra once had sex with a gay colleague. The role of women in this male society is ambivalent, sometimes they are able to react and fight for their dignity, and at other times they are the victims of it. Women who react, behave in a very diverse range of ways: In The
Life and Love of a She Devil (1983), the rage of the woman betrayed is so
strong that she turns into a sort of “devil”, a madwoman determined to spoil her former husband’s life; in The Bulgari Connection (2001), the main character goes to jail because of a failed attempt at murdering his husband’s new partner; in The Fat Woman’s Joke (1967), her first novel written during the years of the sexual liberation, we are in front of four diverse typologies of women: Susan, a hippy libertine who thinks she is in total control of her own body but ends up trapped in men’s ruthless society; Brenda, the antithesis of the feminist modern woman, “a betrayer of her sex”16; Phillis, a stupid air-head victim of men’s rules; and, finally, Esther, who, although her behaviour becomes pathological after her husband’s adultery – she can’t help eating out of all proportions – at least manages to react and start anew.
It can be said that Weldon is, or better was, a feminist. However, times have changed and mere protest has given way to a wider kind of social analysis. Indeed, when the struggle for equality ceased to be as prominent as it was in the 1960s and 1970s, the subject of Weldon’s criticism has been modern society rather than women’ rights. From the 1980s on, she has progressively abandoned pure feminist complaint, though still being focussed on the family and its dynamics. Novels such as Worst Fears (1995) or The Bulgari Connection
(2001), for instance, have nothing to do with feminism or make any reference to
it. They simply concentrate on female-male relationships in a modern society resulting from both patriarchy and feminism. To conclude, the author is
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apparently a feminist because her stories still continue to belong to a female context and because, since she is a woman herself, she tends to tell them from a female point of view. As she said in an interview:
Even if the books were written by women, women were just reacting to men. In my books, women might still be reacting to men, but they take up more space on the page, and this makes men feel at a loss which, by inference, means I’m feminist.17
Our society has changed and the feminist struggle is nowadays anachronistic. During the same interview she said: “Men nowadays aren’t s***. They are actually much nicer”18. She has recently even made some provocative statements, as is her style, that are at odds with the typical feminist precepts of her first novels such as The Fat Woman’s Joke (1967). She has stated that:
It's such a waste of time trying to tell your husband to pick up the socks or clean the loo. It's much easier just to do it yourself […] Women want boyfriends to be like their girlfriends, fun to go to the pictures with, but men are not like that. They want sex and they grunt. If you really want a man to be nice to you, never give him a hard time, never talk about emotions and never ask him how he is feeling.
She also said that women should have babies early, and then go out to work, and suggested they should be less picky when looking for a partner. More recently she said the problem with most feminists was that they were so boring. She has always been controversial; in 1998 she came under fire for some of her comments about rape saying that it is not the worst thing that can happen to a woman. In an interview given for the BBC radio in 1998, she admitted that she had been a victim of attempted rape. She said:
It was nasty, but didn't shatter my view of men. Death is worse. Now it's very unfashionable to say this, but if you are alive and
17 http://bombsite.com/issues/30/articles/1286
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unmarked then there are worse things that can happen to you” and added: “Defining it as some peculiarly awful crime may even be counter-productive. I'd like to see it defused for women and deglamorised for men by returning it to the category of aggravated assault.
The Association Woman Against Rape was furious and defined Weldon’s comment as outrageous while the Campaign Against Domestic Violence said that she was talking about rubbish19. In 2001 she once again became the subject of controversy with The Bulgari Connection (2001) when it was revealed that she had been paid 18,000 pounds to quote the jeweller at least 12 times20. Critics accuse her of losing touch with the aspirations of women21. It is not the first time that Weldon has challenged conventional feminism to side with a more realistic point of view and extend her sarcastic manners to all components of a society that has only recently started to distance itself from the values of patriarchy. She once claimed that she has already arrived to “the next stage of feminism” while the others are backward. She said: I’ve always been several years ahead of my time. That’s been my problem throughout life. People don’t know it yet, but they’ll catch up22. Calcot Crescent (2009), one of her latest books, bears witness to this tendency to leave aside outdated issues. Here men still rule, but it is the government that represents the true enemy and the ultimate patriarchal authority. She writes about the Shock, the Crunch, the Squeeze, the Recovery, the Fall, the Crisis and the Bite viewed by the eyes of an old woman who witnessed five decades of world history – the fall of communism, the death of capitalism – and now, with the bailiffs, world history has finally reached her doorstep23 urging her to deal with more relevant, new issues that can constitute an innovative source of inspiration. As the world changes, Weldon’s issues gradually do so.
19 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/122813.stm 20 http://bookreview.mostlyfiction.com/2010/chalcot-crescent-by-fay-weldon/ 21 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-1209154/Fay-Weldon-Women-life-easier-picked-mens-socks-cleaned-loo.html 22 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/122813.stm 23 http://redmood.com/weldon/chalcotcrescent.html
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1.3 Wicked Women (1996)
My work focuses on an analysis and translation of four tales belonging to
Wicked Women (1996). This collection of short stories is solidly structured. It is
composed by sixteen tales divided into six sections entitled: Tales of Wicked Women, Tales of Wicked Men, Tales of Wicked Children, From the Other Side, Of Love, Pain and Good Cheer and Going to the Therapist. The first three titles suggest that, as argued before, Weldon’s witty criticism spares nobody. The four short stories which I have translated belong to the first, fourth and fifth sections. All of them deal with male adultery but show different levels of gravity. Marital treachery has a multitude of psychological implications on the people who experience it. Different nuances can depend on how frequently it happens, for instance, or on the degree of involvement of the lovers, on the importance of the wife-husband relationship and also on the reaction of the person who is betrayed. Treachery in the short stories Run and Ask Daddy If He
Has Any More Money and Pains is undoubtedly less serious than in A Good Sound Marriage and in The Great War (II). The Great War (II), in particular,
has a horrible, tragic connotation. Here, Weldon gathered some of the most important issues of her work. My analysis will concentrate on these four short stories, one by one, by following the aforementioned order of importance.
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2. THE FOUR SHORT STORIES:
2.1 Introduction to Run and Ask Daddy If He Has Any More
Money
This short story tells about a man, David, who meets again the woman, Bettina, with whom, seven years before, he had an extra-marital relationship. Easter is just around the corner and David is helping his wife, Milly Frood, in her shop, when he suddenly hears Bettina’s voice which causes him a series of mixed emotions and painful flashbacks. In between his thoughts and fears, he understands that the little girl to whom Bettina is talking is not her husband’s daughter and he gets even more nervous. The narrator says: “The little girl had red hair like David’s own. Bettina had black hair; Daddy’s was fair and painfully sparse, as if responsibility had dragged a lot of it out”24. Panic-stricken, afraid that truth may come to the surface, David tries to busy himself with doing other things, until Bettina recognises him but she just compliments Milly Frood on her shop and goes away. And David is “let off the hook” (p.75). This short story belongs to the section named “Wicked Women” because it is told from the male protagonist’s point of view. Here, Fay Weldon, differently from what she is used to do, sees events from a male perspective and, consequently, Bettina is depicted as the woman who first seduced and then abandoned David. Bettina, unlike dull Milly Frood, is “attractive,” has a “bosomy figure” and “had murmured many a sinful suggestions” to him; but, once she decided to stop seeing him, she turned into an “unfeeling, whimsical person” (pp.72-73). David has always thought that Bettina was being wicked when she decided to split up, give up hiding and abandon him “on the floor behind the sofa in the History Tutorial Room” (p.74) of the university in which he works. Only today, he becomes aware of the fact that, perhaps, that was the first time that she was not being selfish and separation was right. In the shop, Bettina smiles at David and tells Milly Frood how much she likes her shop. By saying this, she definitively buries the hatchet, showing that she has made a clean break with the past. On the contrary, David is troubled by her sudden
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appearance and, through a sort of stream of consciousness, he lets the reader know that, although he loves her wife, he has always been aware of her limitations. Milly Frood is undoubtedly a good, reliable woman, but she is a bit stiff and often teased by her friends because of her seriousness. Although she “had cooked his food, burped his babies, returned the VAT, encouraged him in love and in illness,” although he can see that “Milly is good, what a man wants is something more than honest worth” (pp.73-76). Moreover, he did not want children from her, afraid that they could limit his freedom. Trapped in the humdrum of everyday life, Bettina had meant escape to him. However, this chance encounter in the shop is decisive and David finally understands that he has no grudge against her anymore and can let her get out of his mind. Milly represents his present and now he can finally be grateful to her for what she has done for him and his children. As I said before, symbolism is frequently used by the author. Here, the main symbol is the Peruvian crucifixion scene, one of the items sold in Milly’s shop, on which David concentrates in order to avoid Bettina’s sight. Particularly, one “piece in brightly glittering tin” (p.74) that makes up the scene is first mentioned by the narrator, Judas, the symbol of betrayal, the man who cheated Jesus Christ, responsible for his arrest and consequent death. That symbol perfectly fits a story dealing with treachery and represents David’s guilt. The fact that a man who committed adultery chooses to focus his attention on the allegory of betrayal is quite emblematic. In addition, the short story takes place in the Easter time, when treachery gives way to rebirth. Indeed, this can apply to David. It is as if he comes to life again when, in the end, he realises that Bettina has no more influence on him. The short story ends by wishing everybody Happy Easter. The narrator states: “there is no need for explanation, or excuse” (p.78). Everything is finally resolved and sinners, at least during Easter time, can be pardoned.
In Run and Ask Daddy If He Has Any More Money, Weldon uses an experimental style. Firstly, the story’s peculiarity lays in its timing. In two minute’s time, the story starts, develops and ends. It is two minutes past four when David hears Bettina’s voice inside the shop, and four minutes past four when she goes out. It is clear, therefore, that the story’s strength cannot rest on
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its action. Indeed, this brief short story has a lot of digressions and the character’s action is interwoven with David’s thoughts and other considerations. Weldon’s terse, almost journalistic style alternates with many paragraphs exclusively dealing with the main character’s turmoil, anxiety about what is going to happen, ravings and mental digressions provoked by his concern about the tangled situation in which he is involved. Descriptions are detailed but they tend to take no notice of the surrounding setting and mainly concentrate on the feelings and thoughts that are going on in David’s mind. During a two-minute incident, David, gazing at a shelf, thinks about his past relationship with Bettina, judges Bettina’s husband, complains about Milly, is grateful to Milly, is toying with a “Peruvian crucifixion scene”, realises that the little girl is probably her daughter, considers the effects of the Greeting Card Industry in the Market, etc. The narrator says: “Such things pass quickly through the mind when sights are seared into a man’s heart, and he doesn’t know what to think and feel, and he’s gazing at a shelf” (p.75). However, the author also provides very detailed descriptions of the characters – from their physical appearance to their personality and behaviour – and beautiful metaphors. In Fay Weldon’s work metaphors are often present. Here, the past is compared to a foreign country. However, although it can be far from our present life, thanks to “frequent international flights from there to here, especially during the public holidays,” it inevitably ends up to “burrow away like some mole through the pleasant green fields of the present, surface and spoil everything in an explosion of mud and dirt” (pp.71-76). The narrator insists on the fact that although we might “all grow an entirely new skin every seven years” (p.72), our past is just around the corner, threatening to damage our lives and relationships and hoping to reveal the skeleton we have in our cupboards. The omniscient narrator plays a role of great importance within this story, it is certainly intrusive and frequently gives personal opinions. It even knows David personally and says that he did not want to have babies. The strong presence of the narrator is a typical characteristic of Weldon’s fiction. In addition to the narrative device of digression, the author uses the strategy of irony too. It permeates the protagonist’s thoughts and actions and it is mainly evident in some of his
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behaviours which keep the ‘seriousness’ of the situation at a distance. The fact that David, instead of taking matters into his own hands, finds it appropriate to stare catatonically at inanimate objects such as shelves or biblical scenes appeals to the reader. Simple irony becomes wit sarcasm when the narrator, continuing to wandering about men’s tendency to commit adultery, says: “But a man’s seed bursts from him here and there, unwittingly” (p.76). Although it can be argued that Run and Ask Daddy If He Has Any More Money is unusual because, differently from most of Weldon’s story, it is written from a male perspective, this sentence reasserts the author’s typical irreverent style by subtly criticising men’s difficulty to face up to their responsibility while managing their relationships with the ‘weaker sex’. That is not their fault! It is women that, sexy and enticing, lead them into temptation.
Graphically, the text is composed by groups of paragraphs separated by blank spaces or, sometimes, three asterisks. This characteristic is common to all short stories contained in the collection. Like in a written drama, graphic pauses are useful to determine a change of scene, while asterisks seem to divide the story in different acts. Most Wicked Women (1996) tales have a subtitle. Here it is: An
Exercise in Italics. Indeed, the peculiarity of this short story is that some key
words and important phrases are written in italics. Only by reading exclusively these words, the reader can guess the central thread of the plot. The narrator, while intruding for the first time, states that the italics is useful to underline the significance of some words and sentences within the text.
Because of the fact that this and most stories by Fay Weldon tell about the everyday life of common people, the register is colloquial and natural.
2.2 Corri a chiedere a papà se ha altri soldi
Un esercizio in corsivo
Dunque, era Pasqua e il mio amico David stava aiutando sua moglie Milly Frood in negozio quando udì una voce che subito riconobbe gridare forte e chiaro
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attraverso la stanza affollata: “Corri a chiedere a papà se ha altri soldi” e il sangue gli si raggelò nelle vene.
Pasqua è alle porte. Un periodo in cui dovremmo riflettere sui nostri peccati e
prendere in considerazione il dolore che causiamo agli altri, specialmente a coloro a cui non rimane altra scelta che sopportarci. Questo trauma della conoscenza-rivelazione del sé, culmina di Venerdì Santo, lasciandoci il sabato per fare i preparativi e riprenderci, così da poterci svegliare la domenica euforici per il nostro nuovo “io” e poter disporre del lunedì per riposarci un po’ e prepararci all’idea di dover tornare a lavoro. Dovremmo… Ma per lo più ci limitiamo a scambiarci bigliettini e uova di Pasqua, grati di essere in vacanza.
David ha poco più di quarant’anni. Ha i capelli rossicci e piuttosto radi, ma la
barba, molto rossa, è folta. E’ solito indossare una giacca di tweed. Adesso è docente universitario. Un tempo era un comune insegnante, ma il suo istituto universitario25 si era trasformato in un’università e… voilà! Ecco il Professor Frood, un pilastro della società, stimato e meritevole di fiducia, un padre di famiglia. Anche una brava persona, di tipo ottimista, incline ad amare non saggiamente, ma troppo, come lo sono le persone migliori. Ma tutto questo nel passato, naturalmente. I professori universitari non fanno casini, la posta in gioco è troppo alta. Tutto quello che uno può fare è sperare che il passato, facendosi strada scavando come una talpa tra le amene distese verdi del suo presente, non torni in superficie rovinando tutto in un’esplosione di fango e melma.
25
In the text, the Italian translation “istituto universitario” stands for the English word “Polytechnic”. A polytechnic was a type of tertiary education teaching institution in England, Wales, and Northern Ireland. Most polytechnics were formed in the expansion of higher education in the 1960s. After the passage of the Further and Higher Education Act in 1992, they became universities which meant they could award their own degrees. The comparable institutions in Scotland were collectively referred to as Central Institutions. Like polytechnics or technological universities in other countries, their aim was to teach both purely academic and professional vocational subjects. Their focus was applied education for work and their roots concentrated on engineering and applied science, though soon after being founded they also created departments concerned with the humanities.
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Quel particolare giovedì di Pasqua, alle quattro e due minuti del pomeriggio, sembrava proprio che potesse accadere.
Qualche volta gli amici chiamano Milly Frood Frilly Mood26. Lo fanno ironicamente; Milly non ama per niente i fronzoli, è una brava donna, seria e gentile. Ha i capelli diritti e porta la frangia, il suo viso, paffuto e rotondo, è piuttosto inespressivo e il suo corpo nascosto da abiti sobri. I figli dei Frood, Sherry e Baf, ormai adolescenti, non hanno mai mangiato né zucchero né carne senza il permesso dei genitori, sotto il loro tetto: ci ha pensato Frilly Mood. I ragazzi sono forse piuttosto magri, ma sani e molto educati. Frilly Mood li ha cresciuti bene. Essere seri non è poi un gran crimine.
Il negozio si trova lungo la High Street, fra la gastronomia e l’agenzia immobiliare. E’ un elegante negozio di articoli da regalo che vende il genere di chincaglierie decorative di cui nessuno ha bisogno ma che a tutti fa piacere avere, dalle ciotole di cartapesta (francesi) dai colori intensi e pieni a sessantacinque sterline, ai portapillole a forma di elefante nero (malesi) a due sterline e settantacinque centesimi, i conigli di peluche (coreani) a dodici sterline e trentacinque, gli agnellini di lana (neozelandesi) a otto sterline e mezzo, le uova di pasqua decorate (inglesi) a quattro sterline e ottantasette e così via. Di questi tempi, nel periodo che precede la Pasqua c’è quasi altrettanto lavoro che in quello che precede il Natale. Tutti sentono il bisogno di un non necessario qualcosina in più, altrimenti, che senso avrebbe la vita? Dove sarebbero le ricompense?
David stava dando una mano a Milly in negozio nella calca subito prima di Pasqua. E perché non avrebbe dovuto farlo? La scuola (scusate, Università) era chiusa per le vacanze (scusate, periodo di sospensione delle attività didattiche accademiche) e, come diceva Milly, David non avrebbe avuto ‘niente di meglio
26 By reversing the order of the first letters of this name, the author creates a pun in which the assonance is maintained
and the meaning modified in order to achieve a specific semantic purpose. The result is Frilly Mood, in which frilly means having or being keen on wearing decorative ruffles or frills and mood indicates a person’s state of mind or feeling.
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da fare’. Il suo stipendio rimaneva quello di un insegnante qualsiasi, anche se adesso lo chiamavano professore. Si può dare un nuovo nome a tutto quello che ci pare e piace, ma la dura realtà non cambia solo perché l’abbiamo fatto. In altre parole, i soldi erano pochi e se Milly ce l’avesse fatta senza personale extra, tanto meglio. Però per David darle una mano era un’umiliazione e di questo dava la colpa a Milly. Secondo Milly un uomo lavora solo quando lo si può vedere realmente all’opera, ma chi è che riesce a vedere un uomo pensare?
La voce che riconobbe era quella di Bettina Shepherd; aveva un doppio timbre
da attrice estremamente seducente (in corsivo perché è francese, non perché abbia rilevanza in questa storia) e gli era familiare perché c’era stato un tempo in cui aveva pronunciato molte parole di vero amore, mormorato molte peccaminose proposte nelle sue orecchie. Ma tutto questo era successo circa sette anni prima; tanto tempo fa: di più, sicuramente, di quello necessario per far sentire l’uomo di adesso responsabile per quello di allora. D’altronde non cambiamo tutti pelle completamente ogni sette anni? Non dovrebbe forse esserci concesso di ricominciare daccapo? Come succede con la patente di guida, non dovrebbe il passaggio del tempo azzerare gli errori passati?
Papà era l’uomo a cui Bettina si riferiva: era nel retro del negozio, dove c’erano
le cianfrusaglie a poco prezzo. Bettina era particolarmente attraente nel suo abito di cashmere color giallo primavera, con una catenella in vita, che, all’apparenza, sembrava di oro puro. Il tutto metteva in risalto la sua figura procace, il sottile girovita e i capelli neri. Papà era vestito di grigio, distinto e di bell’aspetto e aveva la cravatta fermata da un grosso spillone d’oro. David pensò che avesse un’aria estremamente noiosa e piuttosto stupida, ma anche lui, David, dava questa impressione, o no?
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“David, deve finire”, gli aveva detto Bettina nell’Aula di Tutoraggio27 di Storia, un giorno, sette anni prima. “Sei un uomo sposato, e anch’io mi sto per sposare. La cerimonia è la settimana prossima. Volevo dirtelo prima, ma non mi piaceva l’idea di farlo perché non ti volevo turbare. Sei il solo uomo che io abbia mai davvero amato, ma devo pensare al mio futuro. Dobbiamo essere realistici. Tu non riusciresti mai a mantenere adeguatamente due famiglie e io non sono proprio tagliata per lavorare. Non sono quel tipo di persona.” David pensò che il cuore gli si sarebbe spezzato. Fu sorpreso che continuasse a battere. Dopo si disse che era fortunato ad essere fuori da una relazione insignificante e passeggera con una persona così insensibile e capricciosa, ma era davvero così? La verità era che da allora non aveva più provato vero piacere nei capelli lisci di Milly e nel suo viso sincero. Capiva che Milly era una brava donna, ma quello che un uomo vuole è qualcosa di più di onesto valore. A volte si sentiva in colpa perché gli altri chiamavano ironicamente sua moglie Frilly Mood, ma poi si ripeteva che era sempre stata così. Non era colpa sua.
Gli si raggelò il sangue nelle vene, lo dico con cognizione di causa. Quando
David sentì la voce di Bettina – udita per l’ultima volta sul pavimento, dietro il divano, nell’Aula di Tutoraggio di Storia – echeggiare nel negozio alle quattro e due minuti, sentì un brivido propagarsi dalla spalla destra, al braccio e giù alle dita ed ebbe la sensazione che se quella parte di sangue non si fosse riscaldata prima di ritornare al cuore, questo si sarebbe congelato e si sarebbe fermato una volta per tutte. Un cuore non riesce a sopportare più di tanto.
David voltò le spalle ai suoi clienti, per timore d’esser visto e riconosciuto da Bettina e si mise a cercare la scena di crocifissione peruviana, grato che il suo
27 The Thesaurus for Education Systems in Europe defines the British tutor as the person who provides his
student for a personal assistance aiming to let him assume the responsibilities of his own education. The role of the tutor widely differs according to diverse educational contexts, school systems or pedagogical patterns. Tutors in Great Britain have a stronger connotation than in other European countries such as, for instance, Italy. They play a more important role within the educational institution.
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cuore fosse sopravvissuto allo shock, ma non prima di aver visto la bimbetta lasciare ubbidiente il fianco della madre e dirigersi attraverso borse della spesa e braccia coperte da stoffe a fiorellini verso suo padre. Bettina, vicina alla porta, era chiaramente interessata ad acquistare le ciotole di cartapesta a sessantacinque sterline; papà sfogliava i bigliettini di Pasqua nel retro del negozio.
La scena di crocifissione peruviana era composta da sei pezzi di stagno rilucente: un Giuda porpora, un Gesù d’oro, un Ponzio Pilato blu scuro, una Maria Maddalena scarlatta, una Madonna azzurra e una croce nera.
La bimbetta aveva i capelli rossi come quelli di David. Bettina aveva i capelli neri; quelli di papà erano biondi e penosamente radi, come se le responsabilità ne avessero strappati via molti. La bimbetta doveva avere sei anni. A provarlo, gli incisivi mancanti.
I bigliettini di Pasqua erano la cosa più economica venduta in negozio. Con settantacinque pence si potevano comprare quelli che raffiguravano conigli e polli; da quella cifra fino alle due sterline si poteva trovare qualsiasi cosa che un artista in tempo di recessione potesse inventare. Milly e David Frood vedevano la novità del biglietto pasquale come uno dei risultati più sinistri dell’ Industria dei Bigliettini di Auguri. Chi, in gioventù, ha mai sentito parlare dei biglietti di Pasqua? Fa tutto parte della commercializzazione della religione, ecc., ecc. Obbligati a vivere di commercio, i Frood lo disprezzavano. Per chi vale il contrario?
Questi pensieri attraversano rapidi la mente di un uomo quando certe immagini sono impresse nel suo cuore e non sa cosa pensare o provare e si ritrova a fissare una mensola.
David sentì una mano familiare appoggiarsi sulla sua spalla. Era quella di sua moglie. “Forse dovremmo avere un altro bambino”, disse con suo ulteriore sbigottimento.
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“Perché adesso?” disse lui. “Perché dici questa cosa proprio adesso, con tutto il daffare che abbiamo?”
“Perché abbiamo sempre da fare”, ribatté Milly Frood in modo insolito per il suo carattere, “come tutti quelli che non ricevono il sussidio di disoccupazione. E poi ho appena visto un bambina piccola qui in negozio con i capelli dello stesso splendido colore dei tuoi da giovane e ho pensato: ultima chance per avere un figlio. Ho quasi quarant’anni ormai.” Prima che David potesse replicare, una voce dietro di lui chiese: “C’è nessuno qui?”. Milly Frood tornò velocemente al lavoro e David fu salvo.
La mano familiare aveva cucinato il suo cibo, aveva fatto fare il ruttino ai suoi
bambini, si era occupata dell’IVA, lo aveva incoraggiato in amore e in malattia e David si rese conto che erano ben sette anni che non le era grato per questo. Ora, improvvisamente, lo era. Ma l’abitudine di criticare rimaneva. “Perché proprio adesso?” aveva detto, scoraggiando così la spontaneità e comportandosi da antipatico. Si vergognava di se stesso.
Un altro bambino. Innanzitutto David non aveva mai veramente voluto dei
bambini: non voleva sposarsi. Era solito a parlarmene quando si lamentava della banalità quotidiana della sua vita. La scuola, i ragazzi, i negozi, le bollette e mai niente che accadesse. Ma il seme dell’uomo irrompe dal suo corpo per posarsi qua e là, a caso, e una brava persona si sistema prendendosi le sue responsabilità, a volte con la giusta disposizione d’animo ed altre no. Un altro bambino? All’improvviso David ebbe la sensazione che Milly avrebbe potuto ottenere qualsiasi cosa. Mettiamo il caso che Bettina lo vedesse, riconoscesse e salutasse. Allora tutto sarebbe semplicemente andato in pezzi. E se invece papà si fosse messo a guardare prima i capelli di sua figlia e poi la barba rossa ricordandosi di qualche indizio, tempo o luogo? E’ un uomo saggio quello che dubita della sua paternità se sua moglie si chiama Bettina. Se questo… Se quello…
Salvo. Naturalmente non era salvo. Il passato può anche essere una terra
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durante le ricorrenze festive, quando tutti lasciano le loro case e si accalcano in cerca di oggetti, senza preoccuparsi di chi ricorda che cosa. Una ciotola di cartapesta qui e un bigliettino di Pasqua là.
“Papà”, disse la vocina stridula. Somigliava a quella di Sherry? A quella di Baf? Sì. “la mamma dice se hai altri soldi”.
Il silenzio scese sul negozio. Tutti attendevano la risposta: mamme, donne divorziate, vedove, lavoratrici e i loro accompagnatori, se ne avevano. Sono soprattutto le donne che vanno per negozi. Bimbette mingherline. Seienni pel di carota con fessure fra i denti che guardano con occhi pieni di fiducia presunti padri. Una domanda onesta, posta in modo onesto, in periodo di recessione.
David si voltò. Non si può stare a guardare un solo scaffale per sempre. David colse lo sguardo di Bettina. Bettina sorrise, riconoscendolo e dimostrando di averlo riconosciuto. Le labbra di Bettina non erano proprio così piene e carnose come una volta. Tutti aspettavano. Una domanda fatta in pubblico vuole risposta pubblica.
“Dì a tua madre,” replicò Papà ad alta voce, “che la risposta è no. I miei soldi se ne sono andati tutti, è tua madre che li ha spesi”.
Papà rovesciò di proposito la scatola di bigliettini di Pasqua per terra e, aprendosi un varco tra clienti con giacche grigie e mani rivestite di anelli d’oro, si diresse verso la porta e uscì. La bimbetta gli corse dietro singhiozzando. David vide Papà prenderla per mano mentre passavano davanti alla finestra. La vide sorridere: evidentemente la piccola piangeva per niente e per niente si consolava. Sherry era stata così.
Se una donna rimane senza soldi magari ritornerà all’amore…
Bettina esitò per un momento, tutti gli occhi erano puntati su di lei. Guardò Milly, guardò David. Poi disse a Milly: “Mi piace proprio questo negozio”, e seguì suo marito e sua figlia fuori. Erano le quattro e quattro minuti.
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Bettina si era ritrovata incinta, forse di uno, forse dell’altro. Dopotutto, forse non
era stata insensibile e capricciosa a lasciarlo, lui, David, dietro il divano, nell’Aula di Tutoraggio di Storia. Forse lasciarlo era stato un atto d’amore, per salvare l’uomo sposato colpevole. Forse aveva semplicemente fatto la cosa giusta. Giudicando meglio Bettina, perdonandola, David sentì che si stava liberando completamente da lei. Ed era anche ora. Sette anni interi!
Mi piace proprio questo negozio.
“Che cara donna” disse Milly. “a dirci questo. Ma per caso ti conosceva?”
“No”, disse David. “e tu sei la donna più cara che io conosca”, e si rese conto che, nonostante la prima fosse una bugia, la seconda era la verità. Buona Pasqua
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2.3 Introduction to Pains
This is the story of a pregnant woman (or as the subtitle states, of Most
Contemporary Women) called Paula who is lying alone on her bed racked by
pain. That pain is both physical and psychological; the former keeps the latter alive. She is about to give birth to her baby and her womb is aching, but she is also worried about her husband. Deakey, Paula’s husband, is a good, idealist man who works in the Civil Service. He is, with his wife, a member of a local Women’s Liberation Group. However, although he has always supported fairness between the sexes and honesty in marriage, Paula suspects that he has a relationship with a neighbour whose name is Audrey. Paula’s jealousy is so strong that her physical pain takes second place and she cannot even realize that labour has started. Unaware of her condition and pedantically doubting Deakey’s integrity, Paula wants to know if her suspicions are true and, thanks to a hole in the floor, she can hear what is happening in the room below, where Deakey is holding a meeting of the Group. That night, among Deakey’s guests there is also Audrey, even if she is not part of the group. While Paula is racking her brain upstairs, Deakey and the other women talk about the role of the sexes and complain about society and the effects that patriarchy has had on it. At the end of the meeting, when everybody returns home, Audrey stays behind. Paula can hear Deakey and Audrey talking and her anxiety grows. Anyway, her physical pain is almost unbearable. Finally, she gives birth to the baby, a boy. As in Run and Ask Daddy If He Has Any More Money, the narrative focuses on the main character’s sensations rather than on the action of the story, which is quite static. Paula is lying still on her bed, but her thoughts are anything but still. The narrator tells the reader about Paula’s fears and lets him enter her obsessed state of mind and share her anxiety, feel her pain. It is as if Paula herself is telling the story. Events are not faithfully reported to reality because they are filtered by the main character’s point of view and consequently seen from her perspective. Pains introduces one of Weldon’s typical characters. Paula is left alone by her husband in a difficult moment of her life. Eight and a half months pregnant, she feels awful, paralysed by pain, while her husband
26
seems to underestimate her condition. He naively says to his guests: “Paula’s still lying down, she went to a relaxation class this evening and it’s exhausted her, ha ha” (p.213). He does not even suspect what is going on, upstairs, but this is not his fault: Paula herself is unaware of what is going to happen. They both are oblivious of the situation and unprepared for the big event. Regardless of Deakey’s claiming that she is unreasonably obsessive, Paula often accuses her husband of being adulterous. Paula is just one of the multitudes of worried women that populate Weldon’s universe. Almost everyone has every reason for being paranoid. For instance, Annette, Affliction (1993), feels that there is something wrong with her husband. First, he insists that there is nothing to worry about, then, he gradually persuades her that she is mad. Finally she will find that he is seeing an analyst who uses an astrological approach in order to convince him to divorce his wife. Even if Alexandra’s friends and relatives keep telling her that she must calm down and placate her Worst Fears, she cannot help thinking that her deceased husband had a double life and she will finally discover that she is right. However, this time, Paula is probably wrong. Her distrust of her husband is so strong that she ends up to misunderstand reality. Paula thinks that, although Deakey certainly believes in equality and entertains noble principles, paternalistic society inevitably leads men to behave wrongly. This concept is also supported by Sybil, one of the Group’s members. She complains that men do not have feelings or “if they do, they invalidate them in relation to the degree of their involvement with male institutions. The nicest men will murder, sacrifice, betray, die in the name of patriotism, religion, efficiency, progress” and even the Civil Service (p.214), mentally adds Paula while eavesdropping. This short story mentions some topics of feminism, included several stereotypes linked to manhood. By the time Wicked Women
(1996) was written, Weldon had already left behind some of the themes that had
made her famous in the 1970s. Here, those themes come up again but the author’s position has become more moderate. The result is that feminists in Deakey’s living room are depicted like adamant women, unshakeable in their convictions, also colourful sometimes, grumbling and “sitting down in familiar, conspiratorial rings” (p.209), showing slips, throwing wedding rings and talking
27
about the “slavery of the wife”, the proletarian condition of women, the “myth of mother-care”, and so on (p.210). Even if the story is probably set in the 1960s, those themes were quite old-fashioned in the late 1990s. Here, Weldon jumps into the past, goes back thirty years to her roots and to the powerful issues that characterized her first novels. This story belongs to the section named “Pain and Good Cheer”; there are not wicked women or wicked men, there simply is a woman with her pain.
Stylistically, the author, as usual, uses some poetic metaphors. Paula, suffering on her bed, is compared to a “poor butterfly with a pin driven through its middle” (p.207). This touching image immediately makes the reader sympathise with Paula’s suffering and concern about her husband and baby, the new life which she keeps inside herself, “the beautiful red rose opening inside, bursting from bud to bloom, thrusting everything aside to make room for it” (p.215).
2.4 Dolore
La storia della maggior parte delle donne contemporanee, 1972.
Paula giace stupefatta sul letto come una povera farfalla con uno spillo conficcato nel centro del corpo. Che siano le contrazioni di inizio travaglio? O forse del falso travaglio, o, magari, essendo più simili a dolori che a contrazioni, sono il segno della cattiva digestione dovuta al piatto al curry che, quella sera, il suo caro marito premuroso di mentalità radicale ha portato a casa dal ristorante da asporto “curry-in-a hurry”28 all’angolo. Chissà.
Paula, al momento, ha la sensazione di sapere ben poco. Tuttavia, prevede di saperne presto di più. Il sistema di riscaldamento centrale è stato appena riparato e c’è un buco nel pavimento, nel punto in cui gli addetti alla manutenzione
28 The expression “curry-in-a-hurry” refers to the take away service carried out by the Indian restaurants in many
English speaking countries. Thanks to the pun (not reproducible in Italian) involving the rhyming nouns “curry” and “hurry”, a common saying indicating the type of food and service given by the restaurant is obtained. In addition, this is the actual name of some take-away Indian restaurants throughout the world. We can find a “Curry in a Hurry” in New York, in Birmingham, in Austin (Texas), in Wellington, etc.
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hanno distrattamente tolto una tubatura. Così adesso Paula può sentire cosa succede nella stanza di sotto.
Laggiù, sospetta Paula, sta succedendo più di quanto dovrebbe accadere.
In quell’istante suo marito Deakey apre la porta ai membri del Movimento locale di Liberazione della Donna. E’ stata una giornata dura per Paula, come Deakey le ha detto almeno otto volte questa sera e, essendo incinta di otto mesi e mezzo, ha ragionevolmente accettato di perdersi la riunione e andarsene a letto.
Fuori si alza la luna.
“Viviamo in una parte inconsueta di Londra,” sono soliti a spiegare Paula e Deakey alle cene con gli amici. “Non proprio elegante, ma è una solida casa edoardiana con un terreno adatto a far crescere le rose. A noi piacciono le rose. Certo, a chi non piacciono, anche se, in particolar modo, a noi piacciono non quelle grandi e moderne che sembrano fatte di plastica, ma quelle piccole, che non si usano più ma che profumano. Sì, il tipo di rose che attira afidi, mosche bianche, lumache e “ogni verme invisibile che vola nella notte, nella tempesta ululante”29, ma noi pensiamo che abbiano un profumo meraviglioso.”
Paula e Deakey amano insieme, pensano insieme, cambiano idea insieme, spruzzano pesticida insieme, provano emozioni insieme, esistono insieme. “Ci crediamo”, dicono. “Sì. Ci siamo trovati. Inseparabili per sette anni interi”
“Perché mai gli uomini non dovrebbero usare i grembiuli, come le donne?” brontolava Deakey la sera prima, di ritorno dal suo lavoro di impiegato statale come il solito alle sette, mentre brandiva lo spremi aglio come un uomo e ne faceva colare la poltiglia sull’impasto del polpettone vegetariano30.
29 This is a part of William Blake’s poem The Sick Rose (from Songs of Innocence and Experience). 30 A nut roast or roasted nut loaf is a rich vegetarian dish consisting of nuts, grains, vegetable oils, broth
or butter, and seasonings formed into a firm loaf shape or long casserole dish before roasting and often eaten as an alternative to a traditional British style roast dinner. It is popular with vegetarians at Christmas as well as part of a
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“Attenta che il bambino non esca che puzza d’aglio”, le aveva detto un amico. Invitano spesso gli amici. Paula e Deakey sono una coppia molto simpatica. Piacerebbero a chiunque. Una sera, la spirale di Paula scivolò fuori, motivo per cui è incinta. Paula e Deakey non sono perfetti, il che li rende ancor più simpatici.
La luna si alza un po’ di più e la sua luce adesso illumina Paula. E’ luna piena. Ad ogni notte di luna piena, regolare come un orologio, a Paula veniva il ciclo. Sempre, fino a otto mesi prima. Fino all’imprevisto incidente della spirale e conseguente interruzione del flusso mestruale. Cos’è questa roba color ruggine? Perché adesso? Magari è solo l’abitudine del corpo, pensa Paula, contorcendosi dal dolore nel momento della contrazione; che cosa meravigliosa è il corpo! Porta con sé i suoi ricordi.
Forse Deakey dovrebbe essere con la sua Paula in questo momento della loro vita insieme, quando la luna splende e il corpo fa male. No, pensa Paula. Non ce n’è bisogno: in ogni caso, Deakey è con me nello spirito e, per di più, qualcuno deve andare ad aprire la porta. Se Paula sta tranquilla e calma, il dolore passerà. Più si calmerà, meglio sentirà. Il resto se lo può immaginare. Marta sta per arrivare. Marta è sempre l’ultima ad arrivare, acida e senza fiato. Adesso si metteranno tutti seduti in cerchio come sempre, come dei cospiratori.
“Ah, i maschi liberali!” starà dicendo sprezzante Marta alle spalle di Deakey mentre lui si allontana per fare il caffè, e se fosse nera direbbe in modo dispregiativo: “Bianchi, bianchi liberali!” e le altre, apparentemente d’accordo, annuiranno ma penseranno com’è bello avere un marito come Deakey, se solo ce lo avessero, invece di dover rabbonire il proprio, calmarlo, mentire, preparare caffè in anticipo, lasciare la loro cena preferita a scaldare nel forno per poter avere il permesso di andare alle riunioni. Beh, riunioni come queste sono
traditional Sunday roast. Nut roasts are also made by Canadian and American vegetarians and vegans as the main dish for Thanksgiving or other harvest festival meals.
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considerate come tradimento domestico. Sì, si tratta tradimento. Lamentele femminili rese pubbliche. Tutto quello che gli uomini fanno quando stanno insieme, lo sanno tutti, è bere, raccontare storielle divertenti e proporsi di far valere i propri diritti: non c’è tradimento in questo. Le donne, invece, non dovrebbero raccontare niente.
Ma parlare è proprio quello che adesso le donne stanno facendo. Non se ne vanno, pienamente consapevoli e mano nella mano, dove un tempo si recavano solo in sogno? Una per una ritornano indietro, a quel lontano mondo del matriarcato e delle associazioni femministe e poi, di nuovo, nel presente, per riportarne la storia. Più che feste d’addio al nubilato, queste, sono cospirazioni cosmiche. Se diventano troppo potenti, se scavano troppo in profondità, il sole stesso potrebbe oscurarsi. Non scordarti le chiavi quando esci, moglie. Potresti non tornare più dentro. Lui fa sul serio.
Perché Paula non ha tappato il buco nel pavimento della stanza da letto? Perché ha bisogno di sapere cosa sta succedendo. Paula sospetta che ogni tanto suo marito Deakey se la faccia al piano di sotto con Audrey, la vicina di casa. Audrey è sposata con un marito adultero. Si sa, la cosa è contagiosa. Chi sa cosa succede quando abbiamo gli occhi chiusi e stiamo dormendo, come dovrebbe dormire Paula in questo momento, se non fosse che il Grande Laccio nel cielo continua a girarle intorno alla vita e, strattonandola forte, l’ha svegliata. Adesso ascolta. Là sotto.
“Il fatto è,” dice l’ingioiellata Rachel seduta con le cosce serrate, “che, come Engels fu il primo ad illustrare, la famiglia nucleare è fondata sulla schiavitù, evidente o celata, della donna. All’interno della famiglia, l’uomo è il borghese e la moglie il proletario. Penso che potremmo utilmente esaminarne le implicazioni.
Oh Deakey. Deakey e Audrey. Se fosse vero, sarebbe più di semplice adulterio, sarebbe Tradimento. Paula ha detto tutto questo a Deakey. Deakey, però,
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sostiene che se c’è un qualche tradimento, questo consiste nella paranoia di Paula, anche se resa più pronunciata del solito dal suo avanzato stato di gravidanza. Così, Paula e Deakey hanno cercato nei loro vari libri sul parto e di risposte umane il termine paranoia in relazione alla gravidanza, e hanno scoperto solo una leggera corrispondenza, cioè che l’acuta invidia dell’utero nel maschio può predisporre a promiscuità distruttiva. “Che assurdità!” aveva sbraitato Deakey etichettando l’autore come simpatizzante freudiano. E Paula fu costretta a concordare. Assurdità! Ad ogni modo, aveva consultato l’ostetrica che le aveva detto di non aver mai sentito parlare di promiscuità distruttiva ma comunque aveva osservato che gli uomini sono tutti uguali e raccontato la storia patetica di come una volta avesse aiutato una sedicenne drogata a dare alla luce dei gemelli. La madre era distesa su di un letto matrimoniale in mezzo a due uomini che, quando gli fu chiesto, rifiutarono di spostarsi e restarono distesi dov’erano, mentre l’ostetrica lavorava, cercando di evitarli.
“Era anche una ragazza molto educata,” aveva detto l’ostetrica.
L’ostetrica aveva portato i bambini in ospedale avvolti nel suo impermeabile e aveva detto che la ragazza non avrebbe mai chiamato per andarseli a prendere.
Cosa sta sentendo adesso Paula? E’ forse la voce di Audrey questa, in mezzo alle altre? Sì, sì. Come mai Audrey è qui? Non fa parte del gruppo. Cos’hanno complottato? Una delicata, flebile vocina di donna. La voce di Audrey.
“Deakey mi ha detto di venire e sapevo che Paula ne sarebbe stata entusiasta così ho accettato l’invito ma, insomma, mi piace essere donna,” dice Audrey. “Beh, che c’è di sbagliato? Voglio dire, non è tutto un po’ ridicolo? Tutti questi reggipetto messi a bruciare. E perché sono tutte così trascurate? Presenti escluse, ovviamente. Una donna ha il dovere di rendersi attraente. Io sono felice come sono. Mi piace essere femmina e che mio marito si prenda cura di me.”
