by Umberto Eco

Fight Club 2 years beforehand

foonami

Aug 24, 2024

Just playin wit da font sizes n shiet

Name: Fight Club 2 years beforehand
Item: The Island of the Day Before
Author: foonami

This novel had a certain rhythm to it I can barely try to describe. Firstly Eco's desire in talking about whatever he wanted to learn about hit its peak with this book and sometimes falls into tedium. Unlike however, the discussions are frequently only tangentially related to the plot and not at all representative of what "should be happening" (specifically in the middle). Stupid as I may be, I am only beginning to realize that this is a book about aging and regrets. Roberto invents Ferrante as an evil character in childhood as that would be unexplored territory for him. Due to his stunted mental growth due to the loss of his father and the battle of Montferrat however this synthesizes with his coming-of-age and Ferrante is now everything he is not: a cunning gambler, a seducer of women, the unrestrained id on a rampage through the salons of Paris.

There is a spiritual sadness to Eco from the books I have read so far. All of his characters are deluded in someway, constantly searching for a deeper meaning when there is none. The prelest which guides these characters are reflective of Eco's own personal life: the demolition of the Italian hyper-nationalist state of his childhood, leaving Catholicism in his college years and the the fears of wasting ones life further on as a professor. He sees how ridiculous the ideas of arcana, secret societies, and in this book specifically, various false scientific notions of the 17th century really are. In order to calm these fears he writes novels that only a medievalist could write with dressed in the idealism he once held dear to but was forced to leave behind as a member of the Italian intelligencia.

By the end of the novel, though Roberto despises Ferrante more than anything on the earth he daydreams of Ferrante's relationship with Lilia - the woman he loves. He justifies this by believing Roberto to be happy believing she is with Roberto as opposed to his soap-operatic evil twin. Both her and the Island which forever remain in the distance represent "the day before" or youth. The priest tries to use modern science to reach that day before and is totally unable to reach it. His mental state resembles the ship completely anchored at one point due to traumatic events. He becomes so enamored with these dreams, the allegory of the island and the memory of Lilia merge so that she is waiting there for him. He burns his ship and swims against the current of time to cross the antipodal line so that he would arrive the day before - waiting for her.