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ms_marple 's review for:
The Lost Daughter
by Elena Ferrante
"A woman’s body does a thousand different things, toils, runs, studies, fantasizes, invents, wearies, and meanwhile the breasts enlarge, the lips of the sex swell, the flesh throbs with a round life that is yours, your life, and yet pushes elsewhere, draws away from you although it inhabits your belly, joyful and weighty, felt as a greedy impulse and yet repellent, like an insect’s poison injected into a vein."
The pseudonymous Italian novelist Elena Ferrante's unique writing style possesses every other element that intrigues her readers. It's smooth, provocative, dark, and unsettling at times. "The Lost Daughter" was no exception to that.
Our protagonist, Leda, a forty-seven-year old divorcee, has quite a busy schedule. With a full-time professor job, she is also the mother of two children, Biannca and Marta. Her daughters have decided to stay for a while in Canada with their father. So, she finally has got some "me" time. Relishing the sudden taste of liberty, she decided to head towards the Ionian coast this summer.
Amidst soaking in the sun, reading books, and writing notes Leda, notices a young woman, Nina, and her child.
"One day I looked up from my book and, for the first time, saw the young woman and the little girl....."
Intrigued by the mother-daughter duo, she starts recalling her time with her daughters and also with her mother. She didn't have a great equation with her mother. And her thoughts on motherhood are quite unusual but gutsy. Hard to relate at times yet difficult to ignore.
“Mama, what are you doing, why haven’t you called? Won’t you at least let us know if you’re alive or dead?”
Deeply moved, I murmured:
“I’m dead, but I’m fine.”
The book left me with a mixed feeling. Ferrante's finely tuned and intense language intrigues me, but at the same time, I can hardly relate with Leda. Still I agree with some of her points. I believe many women at some point in their life felt this way ( may not be as extreme as Leda ) . But they are hardly as expressive as Leda. They're scared to express coz' society will judge them. A man may leave his children behind for career, but when a woman wear the same shoe. She is nothing but 'selfish and heartless.'
It has been recently transformed into a Netfilx adaption movie. It has done complete justice to the novel. Colman, as usual, brilliant!
The pseudonymous Italian novelist Elena Ferrante's unique writing style possesses every other element that intrigues her readers. It's smooth, provocative, dark, and unsettling at times. "The Lost Daughter" was no exception to that.
Our protagonist, Leda, a forty-seven-year old divorcee, has quite a busy schedule. With a full-time professor job, she is also the mother of two children, Biannca and Marta. Her daughters have decided to stay for a while in Canada with their father. So, she finally has got some "me" time. Relishing the sudden taste of liberty, she decided to head towards the Ionian coast this summer.
Amidst soaking in the sun, reading books, and writing notes Leda, notices a young woman, Nina, and her child.
"One day I looked up from my book and, for the first time, saw the young woman and the little girl....."
Intrigued by the mother-daughter duo, she starts recalling her time with her daughters and also with her mother. She didn't have a great equation with her mother. And her thoughts on motherhood are quite unusual but gutsy. Hard to relate at times yet difficult to ignore.
“Mama, what are you doing, why haven’t you called? Won’t you at least let us know if you’re alive or dead?”
Deeply moved, I murmured:
“I’m dead, but I’m fine.”
The book left me with a mixed feeling. Ferrante's finely tuned and intense language intrigues me, but at the same time, I can hardly relate with Leda. Still I agree with some of her points. I believe many women at some point in their life felt this way ( may not be as extreme as Leda ) . But they are hardly as expressive as Leda. They're scared to express coz' society will judge them. A man may leave his children behind for career, but when a woman wear the same shoe. She is nothing but 'selfish and heartless.'
It has been recently transformed into a Netfilx adaption movie. It has done complete justice to the novel. Colman, as usual, brilliant!