Zeno's Conscience (Vintage International) by Italo Svevo

Author:Italo Svevo [Svevo, Italo]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
ISBN: 9781101970225
Publisher: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group
Published: 2015-03-18T00:00:00+00:00

Fazzo l’amor xe vero

Cossa ghe xe de mal

Volé che a sedes’ani

Silo là come un cocal …

is a kind of story or confession. Carla’s eyes shone slyly and confessed even more than the words. There was no fear of shattered eardrums, and I went over to her, surprised and enchanted. I sat beside her and she then retold the song directly to me, half-closing her eyes to say, in the lightest and purest tone, that the sixteen-year-old wanted freedom and love.

For the first time I saw Carla’s little face exactly: the purest oval marked by the deep, curved hollow of the eyes and the delicate cheekbones, made even purer by a snowy whiteness, now that she kept her face turned toward me and to the light, therefore not obscured by any shadow. And those soft lines in that flesh, which seemed transparent yet concealed the blood so well and the veins, perhaps too weak to appear, demanded devotion and protection.

Now I was ready to give her much devotion and protection, unconditionally, even at the moment when I would be so prepared to go back to Augusta, because Carla at that moment asked nothing but a paternal fondness that I could grant without betrayal. What satisfaction! I remained there with Carla, I gave her what her little oval face asked for, and yet I wasn’t moving away from Augusta! My fondness for Carla became more delicate. After that, if I felt the need of honesty and purity, I no longer had to abandon her; I could stay with her and change the subject.

Was this new sweetness due to her little oval face, which I had then discovered, or to her musical talent? Undeniably, to the talent! The strange little Triestine song ends with a strophe in which the same young girl asserts that she is old and decrepit and that by now she needs no freedom except to die. Carla continued slyly to infuse gaiety into the poor verses. It was still youth feigning age, the better to proclaim its rights from that new point of view.

When she finished and found me filled with admiration, she, too, for the first time, while loving me, was also sincerely fond of me. She knew the little song would please me more than what her maestro taught her.

“Too bad,” she added sadly, “that unless you want to sing in cafés chantants, there’s no way you can earn a living from it.”

I easily convinced her this wasn’t how things stood. In this world there were many great artists who spoke their music and didn’t sing.

She made me give her some names. She was overjoyed to learn how important her art might become.

“I know,” she added naïvely, “that this kind of singing is much harder than the other kind, where you just have to yell at the top of your lungs.”

I smiled and didn’t argue. Her art was also difficult, surely, and she knew it because that was the only art she knew. That little song had cost her long hours of study.

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