In “The Story of The Lost Child”, Elena’s fame widens as a lecturer during the feminist movement but she faces a struggle between choosing her strongest loyalties. I really like how Ferrante genuinely highlights the conflict women must endure between professional life, romance, and family.
Elena spends time away from her children and feels guilty, while simultaneously feeling happiness thinking of her time with Nino. She states, “I soon discovered I was getting used to being happy and unhappy at the same time as if that were the new, inevitable law of my life” (76).
Elena also struggles with her romantic life. She displays an inconsistency between her feminist rhetoric and her actions towards Nino. She states, “Although I now wrote about women’s autonomy and discussed it everywhere, I didn’t know how to live without his body, his voice, his intelligence. It was terrible to confess it but I still wanted him, I loved him more than my own daughters….the free and educated woman lost her petals, separated from the woman-mother and the woman-mother was disconnected from the woman-lover from the furious whore, and we all seemed on the point of flying off in different directions” (100). I find this quote incredibly compelling. It perfectly showcases the conflict inside of Elena between her professional, romantic, and family life. She is angered with herself because of the natural desires she has for Nino, while she preaches about women’s independence. She categorizes herself into varying types of women – woman lover, woman mother, and furious whore – and she finds it hard to exist in harmony as all three of those women.
Elena can’t or will not ignore all signs that the relationship with Nino is not a healthy one. It reminds me of the line in film The Leopoard spoken by Tancredi “For things to remain the same, things will have to change.” Which for an Italian prince in 1860 Sicily met a modified monachy was better than a republic. For Elena a life with Nino is better than a life with out him. She has dreamt about him since she was a child and now that she has him she will not let go. So who is doing the changing in this relationship? In each step of their relationship it is Elena. She changes her marriage, she changes her relations with her mother, her mother in law, with Lila, she changes locations where to live, she changes her role as a mother to her children by letting her mother in law take care of them, she even goes as far as to accept Nino as her lover even though he’s a notorious liar with a 8 month pregnant wife. But as an intelligent woman she is ready to ignore everything and she justifies it to herself when she says about their relationship “everything is changing, we are inventing new forms of living together’ (pg. 114) Just so that “things remain the same”. If I was a fortune teller I would bet that Elena is due for more emotional pain.
The vacation on the island of Ischia marks many transitional moments for both Elena and Lila. From the beginning, the beauty of their friendship would emit from the stark contrast they expressed between the two of them: Elena, the timid and thoughtful one. Lila, the bold and fearless one. They have both evolved immensely and at a certain point, it now seems as if Elena has come to yet another realization about Lila. Elena’s boundless love for both Nino and Lila make her suffer, without a doubt, in a self-contradictory manner. She cherishes being their confidantes, desperately trying to ignore the pain of not being Nino’s object of love. However, she now comprehends, or at least, suspects, what had been the root cause of hindering a real relationship. Elena boldly proclaims, “I didn’t possess that emotional power that had driven Lila to do all she could to enjoy that day and that night. I stayed behind, waiting. She, on the other hand, seized things, truly wanted them, was passionate about them, played for all or nothing, and wasn’t afraid of contempt, mockery, spitting, beatings. She deserved Nino, in other words, because she thought that to love him meant to try to have him, not to hope that he would want her.” Elena is often deep in her thoughts, keeping them to herself, never truly revealing their real nature to anyone, not even Lila. One could pinpoint this moment as Elena being envious of Lila’s intense sensitivities and her ability to make everyone fall head over heels for her dangerous and intellectual beauty. However, Elena’s admiration for Lila seems to have grown and matured. She has gained valuable wisdom from this passionate affair between Lila and Nino. She now understands that there is a hidden beauty behind the mask of scandal that uncovers the fear of being found out, punished severely and banished for their adulterous crimes. Unless one takes a dive into their emotions once a while, there is no way to truly understand why a certain person, place or even idea can tug at one’s heartstrings and pushes them to act upon it in a ‘perilous’ manner. Lila understands this and, refusing to consider the reality of the consequences, instead chooses the passion of the moments she spends with Nino, pure happiness, security and newfound respect for life. Elena feels that Lila, unlike her, is able to grasp at opportunity when it comes, while Elena is more cautious. Perhaps, one can say that Elena is Lila’s safety net, protecting her at all costs, even when they’re separated. Verbal defense and emotional connection are part of the knot that ties them together. By involving Elena in the affair, Lila proves that even her boldest adventures cannot be accomplished without her most brilliant friend’s help. Even if it turns out that Nino’s love for her wanes, it will not matter because she has seized him at the most crucial moments in her life and pushing her love past the limits that nature allows.
What’s important to remember, however, is the deeper insight the reader is given into Lila’s mind from, yet again, her notebooks and how it plays into Elena’s new perception of her. Prior to meeting Nino, Lila had felt that her life had been simply a slow but sure marathon towards the finish line of death. Mentally, physically and spiritually, the burning flame that once blazed inside her was slowly being blown out. She had felt as if things were moving at a quick pace that she could not keep up with. Lila, having been surrounded by disturbing events such as family corruption, constant discussions on money, the miscarriage, the beatings from Stefano and her loneliness, had been slowly reaching her boiling point. She had felt trapped, unable to escape from an abyss that captured her independent spirit and placed it far from her own grasp. It is inevitable that, for anyone, when things move at a blinding pace, bringing stress and misfortune one after the other, especially after a change of environment, it can be quite shocking. This makes it plausible that Lila had been experiencing a kind of culture shock, despite remaining in the same city. In Nino, she had found a genuine escape, a real love, instead of a facade and perhaps, new meaning and purpose in her life. It is now clear to her why her own marriage is revolting to her and constantly seems to be falling apart at the seams. While the relationship between Lila and Nino is also tense, it is filled with tenderness and intimacy instead of resentment and hatred.
Based on these analyses, there seems to be a common denominator. Both Elena and Lila are searching for a means to escape in any manner they can the traumatizing stresses of their neighborhoods, new or old. Elena is beginning to find it in this newfound sense of what it means to live life passionately and bravely, while Lila is discovering it in the depths of Nino’s soul that has taken her own as refuge. Regardless of the ugly and dangerous elements of Elena’s and Lila’s adventures, there will always be an element that will tie the two young women together, making their friendship one that cannot be disturbed by the evil outside forces.
Throughout “The Story of a New Name”, Nino’s personality becomes more and more prevalent. He is elusive, charming, intelligent, witty, handsome, and most importantly he seems different than all of the other men in the neighborhood, especially his father. He does not concern himself with the neighborhood drama. Nino is able to use his intellectual charm to physically and emotionally attract many women. He has always been Elena’s only love interest and the one person she obsessively desires. Then, Lila spends more time with him and her attraction to him thickens.
Nino is sexually and intellectually intriguing to both girls. He is an equal who possesses access to a wordly knowledge foreign to Lenu and Lila. He is symbolic and vital to the rivalry between the girls. The girls both crave attention from Nino who represents something else that Lila is able to acquire over Lenu. Nino is symbolic in the sense that he is just another controlling factor in the enduring competition between the girls. The fact that Nino chooses Lila is an unbearable betrayal for Lenu. Present-day Elena writes, “Today I feel some uneasiness in recalling how much I suffered, I have no sympathy for myself of that time” (236). In retrospect, it seems that Elena is critical on her younger self and deems her time and effort was wasted on trivial affairs.
What I find most compelling while reading Ferrante’s second volume is that there is always mutual jealousy between Lenu and Lila. The symbiotic envy between the girls continues from the first novel. Lenu is bitter when Lila gets Nino, while Lila remains envious of Lenu’s academic life that grants her an independence Lila can never attain.
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