In the second half of this chapter, we encounter the happy family returning from the mass celebrated by the Cardinal Archbishop. The tailor is a singular character, literate, but his reading list consists solely of popular fare, such as chivalric romances and the highly fictionalized lives of the saints. He does feel somewhat superior to his fellow villagers:
“If you asked them to repeat exactly what [the Cardinal Archbishop] said, they wouldn’t be able to fish out a word. But they have the feeling inside.”
In his quest for grandiloquence, however, the best he can come up with when he speaks with Borromeo is, “Think nothing of it!”
Don Abbondio hopes to deter Agnese from reporting his behavior to Borromeo.
“But Agnese, well aware that the good man was only pursuing his own interests, left him standing there without making any promises, and indeed without deciding anything, for she had more important matters on her mind.”
Another “meta” moment:
“As the reader knows all too well, it was a story that no one person knew in its entirety.”
Manzoni is commenting not only on his fiction, but also on the writing of history, as we shall see later.
“We were also partly to blame.”
Lucia is an enigmatic character, utterly sincere in her faith, but an easy target for the less righteous. Perpetua called her a “Madonnina infilzata,” which I translated as a “goody-two-shoes.” In Italy, one tradition sees her as a model for Italian womanhood, never voicing her opinions but always steering her husband in the right direction. I see her more in the lineage of Dante’s Beatrice or Petrarch’s Laura, who were more symbols incarnate than actual characters.
Lucia has also been the object of frequent parody on Italian television, most famously in the skits of “Il trio.”
Page 409. The Nameless One takes his leave. In the paragraph beginning on this page, Manzoni shifts into a poetic register (remember that he was a poet before he became a novelist), with the repeated refrain of “Yet he was tired,” “Yet he was tired.” It’s almost a lullaby, singing us to sleep with the reformed man.
Join us on April 10 for a virtual discussion of The Betrothed with Michael F. Moore.
I love the hustle and bustle of the activity taking place inside and outside the house of the tailor and his wife. It reminds me of a scene from a Frank Capra film.
A lovely touch reminiscent of Flaubert is when, from the window in her upstairs room, the tailor's wife, seeing the Cardinal approach her house "had fixed herself up as best she could before running down the stairs" Another favourite moment is when the the Cardinal comes to visit the home of the tailor and his wife to thank the family, the tailor is unable to find the words he feels would have been more appropriate, and shown him in a better light. All the tailor could think to say was "Think nothing of it". In the years to come he would look back in regret that he could come up with nothing better to say in that once in a lifetime opportunity. The tailor is a fully rounded character and a believable human being.
The last pages of the chapter focusing on the Nameless One are true to his character. He is as resolute and determined in his devotion to goodness as he had been in his commitment to evil. Because of his conversion, he becomes almost a Christ-like figure, speaking to his bravi. At the end of his speech or exhortation to his men, Manzoni writes that: "they all filed out together, quietly quietly, like a herd of sheep". There is a hint of the scriptural in this.
One of the most poetic paragraphs is the one beginning, 'Although he had always gone in search of affairs that were complicated and urgent....' The narrator describes the tumult and exhaustion experienced by the Nameless One at the realization that his world and psyche have been turned upside down by his own choice. I love that triple insertion of "Yet he was tired" (eppure aveva sonno). I was reminded of San Juan de la Cruz and his repetition of 'aunque es de noche' (although it is night) in his poem Cantal del alma.
The next paragraph shows the Nameless One, after the previous complexity, return to a state of childhood innocence and simplicity, trust and prayer. The chapter ends in a fading into a timeless panorama of history and myth. Those last three paragraphs form a kind of lovely triptych.
I found the shift into a poetic register a little distracting. It continues the repetition ("quickly, quickly" and "slowly, slowly") that Manzoni introduces seemingly out of the blue in this chapter. It is an idiosyncratic novel, but I wondered why he chose this point to use repetition as a device.