The Lying Life of Adults – Elena Ferrante (2019)

Translated from the Italian by Ann Goldstein

Elena Ferrante’s most recent offering: The Lying Life of Adults was chosen by my book group as our January read. I am still a bit behind in my reviewing – not that it really matters – this was my first book of 2022 and I am currently reading (very, very slowly) my fifth.

I had previously read, and very much enjoyed the Neapolitan quartet and Days of Abandonment from Ferrante, and so rather expected to enjoy this one just as much – only I didn’t really. I can’t say I actually disliked it – and it is well written, and Ferrante manages to get inside a teenage girl’s head in a way which feel extremely authentic, and yet I didn’t engage with the second half of the book as much as the first half, and the toxicity of the relationships really began to irritate me. Two of my book group didn’t actually finish it, one didn’t make it past the fifty page rule – and the ones who did were slightly underwhelmed too. However, I know lots of people have loved this book – and it is an interesting novel – it gave us quite a lot to discuss, and I must admit to rather enjoying Ferrante’s writing style – if nothing else she is very readable.

Giovanna is the narrator, as the novel opens she is twelve years old, an only child living with her parents in a nice, middle class neighbourhood in Naples. Giovanna is at that point where girls do start to change, sometimes becoming awkward or unsure of themselves often very conscious of how they look. One day she overhears a remark by her father, in which he disparagingly compares her face to that of her Aunt Vittoria – Vittoria is estranged from the family, and Giovanna barely remembers meeting her, however it is clear her parents despise her. This unfortunate overheard remark begins to affect the way Giovanna sees everything, particularly herself – she looks eagerly through old family photos, hoping to find evidence that Vittoria – and therefore she also – isn’t ugly. In a bid to find answers – Giovanna decides she must meet Aunt Vittoria. Giovanna is unable to keep her interest in Vittoria to herself and so her reluctant parents are soon drawn in to facilitating the meeting.

Vittoria is Giovanna’s father’s sister – and she has held on tightly to a resentment for years, which has poisoned her against her brother in a way which seems like a total over reaction. She is however delighted – in her way – to meet Giovanna – although she is definitely not a woman to put on airs or roll out the red carpet. She is a difficult, uncomfortable presence – a very different person to Giovanna’s parents, her world is an entirely different one. Vittoria’s world is one which Giovanna is eager to learn about – she has her eyes wide open; she is intelligent and questioning. Vittoria is a rough, dialect speaking, cleaner living in a spawling, noisy working class neighbourhood, it feels like a long way from the nice, polite educated world of conventional intellectuals in which Giovanna has grown up.

“The bond with known spaces, with secure affections, yielded to curiosity about what might happen. The proximity of that threatening and enveloping woman captivated me, and here I was, already observing her every move. Now she was driving a repugnant car that stank of smoke, not with my father’s firm, decisive control or my mother’s serenity but in a way that was either distracted or overanxious, made up of jerks, alarming screeches, abrupt braking, mistaken starts on account of which the engine almost always stalled and insults rained down from impatient drivers to which, with the cigarette between her fingers or her lips, she responded with obscenities that I had never heard uttered by a woman.”

Vittoria once had an intense love affair with Enzo, a married man – it was that which was in part the reason of the rift with her brother. After his death – Vittoria effectively took over his family – the relationship feels very parasitical, and definitely odd. Neither Enzo’s widow, nor any of his three children seem to do much independently of Vittoria, she remains at the heart of their troubled little family, even after all these years. As time passes, Vittoria’s presence in Giovanna’s life will have consequences for her parents lives – and Giovanna begins to see the polite, respectable face her parents and their friends show the world is not the true one. Giovanna becomes infuriated by the deceit she sees around her. As she gets older (the book ends when she around sixteen or seventeen) she is drawn more and more into the world of Enzo’s family – his children are a few years older than her – and these relationships do become rather uncomfortable. Giovanna is looking for answers – and is ripe for sexual exploration and discovery.

“What happened, in other words, in the world of adults, in the heads of very reasonable people, in their bodies loaded with knowledge? What reduced them to the most untrustworthy animals, worse than reptiles?”

This second half of the novel did rather leave me cold – there is just too much teenage angst and introspection for it to maintain my interest. The relationships are just so toxic or uncomfortable that I felt I needed some balance – I don’t generally mind unlikeable characters – but some balance is often needed. Having said all that Vittoria is a brilliantly drawn character, Ferrante really breathes life into her – and the neighbourhood in which she lives is also very well drawn. So, while overall it was a bit of a disappointment, I do understand why some readers have loved it.