Those Who Leave and Those Who Stay (The Neapolitan Novels, #3)

by Elena Ferrante

In conclusion he called me “a girl concerned with hiding her lack of talent behind titillating pages of mediocre triviality.”

What a bitch

I spoke of the necessity of recounting frankly every human experience, including—I said emphatically—what seems unsayable and what we do not speak of even to ourselves.

obscenity, he said, is not alien to good literature,

I should have carried her off, kidnapped her, made her travel with me.

But this, objectively, is not the moment for writing novels.”

Fuck off

Was Franco right, there were other things to do besides write novels?

“A male, apart from the mad moments when you love him and he enters you, always remains outside. So afterward, when you no longer love him, it bothers you just to think that you once wanted him.

Only the child remains, he’s part of you; the father, on the other hand, was a stranger and goes back to being a stranger.

“Nino Sarratore.”

He is disgusting

was necessary, however, to look after him, let him grow, direct him.

girls wanted him, he took them, there was no abuse of power, there was no guilt, only the rights of desire.

“Tell Lina, if you see her, that she was right, I admit it to her. She was right not to give a shit about her husband, her mamma, her father, her brother, Marcello, Michele, all that shit. I should have escaped from here, too, following the example of you two, who are intelligent.

In a short time she had found in San Niccolò, for a laughable rent, because it was a favor, five light-filled rooms, with a large kitchen and an adequate bathroom.

And we thank god

and she even took me to a friend who was a dentist.

it was thanks to her that I discovered that pregnant women love to make love.

You had to hide everything from men.

they preferred to pretend that what happened at the hands of the boss miraculously didn’t happen to the women important to them

handing out a densely written leaflet to people who had difficulty reading, and who, besides, had no reason to subject themselves to the effort of reading, since they already knew those things, they lived them every day, and could tell even worse:

and what has changed

He doesn’t know anything about fighting: never lose sight of your adversary,

Chilling how tfrue thux is tofsy

she was afraid of losing a salary that, even though it was miserable, allowed her to love Enzo without considering him fundamental to her survival and that of Gennaro.

it means grabbing his hands and placing them against your sex as I sometimes did with Franco, ignoring his annoyance, the boredom of the one who has already had his orgasm and now would like to go to sleep.

these men are from hell

Watch me always, even when you leave Naples. That way I’ll know that you see me and I’m at peace.”

that I was about to enter a protective family, a sort of well-fortified castle from which I could proceed without fear or to which I could retreat if I were in danger.

She had moved half the world in a few hours:

From then on everything became fluid, almost as if I possessed the art of making events flow like water from a spring.

“Lenù, I’m a queer, I don’t like girls.”

Hes fucking michele !!!

me.

She got all the tea that day

that reaction seemed to me not consistent with the educated youth who wanted only a civil marriage, and I told him so. We quarreled. Our wedding day arrived and we were not reconciled: he was mute, I cold.

Oh lord

As soon as I was back on my feet I telephoned Lila, I didn’t want her to be angry that I hadn’t told her anything. “It was a wonderful experience,” I told her. “What?” “The pregnancy, the birth. Adele is beautiful, and very good.”

She answered: “Each of us narrates our life as it suits us.”

More often, when I was alone in the house with the baby, I let out terrible cries, not words, only breath spilling out along with despair.

My husband—I soon realized—found it natural to consider Adele ultimately responsible for all his problems.

u cannot marry a man with mommy issues this severe

Pietro picked up my mother at the station in the car, which made her proud, made her feel loved.

In order not to upset him I also learned not to say what I thought.

During that period of weakness, I understood from certain vague remarks that he wasn’t happy about not only the success of my first book but its very publication.

She thought lila was swnding her bad enery its always rhat man

worked so hard on books, but I endured them, I never actually used them, I never turned them against themselves.

And no one knew better than I did what it meant to make your own head masculine so that it would be accepted by the culture of men;

prefer her to you. You’re two pieces of shit and nothing can change you, two examples of underclass filth. But you act all friendly and Lina doesn’t.”

she clowin u in ur home........

he appeared willing to love me only provided that I continually demonstrate my nothingness.

Marriage by now seemed to me an institution that, contrary to what one might think, stripped coitus of all humanity.

But when do people ever speak truthfully and when do things ever happen unexpectedly?

Pietro had grasped her exceptionality so well that he was frightened by it and now felt the need to vilify her.

The day will come when I reduce myself to diagrams, I’ll become a perforated tape and you won’t find me anymore.

These were unstable times, arcing in waves. Many of us feared a return to the flat calm and stayed on the crest, holding on to extreme formulations and looking down with fear and rage.

he didn’t want just a woman, he wanted the woman he imagined he himself would be if he were a woman.

This time Mariarosa burst out laughing, and the almost solemn tone of our conversation changed. Franco associated with Pietro? You’re joking, she said, Pietro has trouble keeping together his own virility, imagine if he has the energy to impose on you his feeling for what a woman is. You want to know something? I would have sworn that you wouldn’t marry him. I would have sworn that, if you had, you would leave him in a year. I would have sworn that you would be careful not to have children. The fact that you’re still together seems to me a miracle. You’re really a good girl, poor you.

Shes clownin u to ur face she just called u a pab

We were therefore at this point: my husband’s sister considered my marriage a mistake and said it to me frankly.

Rock bottom i fear

I said to myself that maturity consisted in accepting the turn that existence had taken without getting too upset, following a path between daily practices and theoretical achievements, learning to see oneself, know oneself, in expectation of great changes.

I discovered everywhere female automatons created by men. There was nothing of ourselves, and the little there was that rose up in protest immediately became material for their manufacturing.

Then the wish to telephone her returned, to tell her: Listen to what I’m thinking about, please let’s talk about it together, you remember what you said about Alfonso? But the opportunity was gone, lost decades ago. I had to learn to be satisfied with myself.