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554 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1994
She had lost her memory four years ago, then only a few months later her words had disappeared. She could see and hear, but could name neither objects nor people, so they lost all meaning.
'Why isn't she a proper Gran? Whose lap you can sit on and who tells stories?
And her mother's voice: 'She's old and tired, Anna. She's had enough of children. And there was never any time for stories in her life?'
What the mother learned from the previous deaths was never to get fond of the new child. And to fear dirt and bad air.
Naturally I thought it was love driving me into Donald's arms. In my generation, we were obsessed with a longing for a grand passion. Hanna, you would've understood nothing whatsoever about love of that kind. In your day, love hadn't penetrated from the upper classes to the depths of peasantry.
We inherit patterns, behaviour and ways of reacting to a much greater extent than we like to admit. It has not been easy to adapt to; so much has been 'forgotten', disappearing into the subconscious when grandparents left farms and countryside where the family had lived for generations.
explanation for why women have found it so difficult to stick up for themselves and make use of the rights an equal society has to offer.