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“Nada” is currently my favorite novel so far. The novel takes place after the Spanish Civil War and the narrator is an orphan named Andrea, who was ecstatic to be able to study literature in Barcelona to the point she carried her luggage by herself as she had enough strength due to “[her] youth and […] read full post >>

This week, I chose to read Agostino over the other option based on a brief summary of this short book. I thought that Agostino sounded more interesting. This story explores the idea of virginity (both sexually and in terms of being young and inexperienced in life), awakening, love, identity, sensuality, adolescence and adulthood. I think I would have had a very different experience reading this text if I was younger or even the same age as the narrator, but reading it now as an 18 year old, I feel like an adult observing the moment of awakening of a new teenager and I honestly secretly felt relieved that I've already passed that phase of my growth. What I mainly got from him was confusion - and the teenage years are definitely some of the most confusing times of our childhoods. Emotions and hormones run high and new doors are opening, and it's when kids start to realize how much deeper life goes than the simple pleasures of children's play. 

18 isn't even that old, and I'm not saying that the hardest part of life has already passed, but when I am presented with someone like Agostino, who is just beginning this chapter of his development and whose most intimate thoughts I can hear, I feel as if I have lived much longer than he has and I feel as though I have decades more experience than he does. I remember when I was 13 years old and I was just passing into the beginnings of the adult stages of my life. Just like Agostino, I was awkward, weird, and unsure where I fit in. I wanted to please other groups of people my age, but I also wanted to stand out and be something more than I was. 

There was one quote that I liked a lot. "So he found that he had lost his original identity without acquiring through his loss another." This quote goes with the theme of identity and Agostino's sense of confusion with who he is and how his relationship with his mother has suddenly transformed. This quote makes me imagine him as something floating, unanchored and submissive to the push of the waves. It's a sense of being lost and not knowing how to realign his person according to his new perspective. I wish there was a way for someone to really help him through his struggle, especially with his odd attraction and attachment to his mom, but he's really just grappling with this on his own.

Here is the question I am presenting this week: If Agostino came to you for advice on how to navigate his confusion on his loss of identity, based on your experience as a teenager, what would you say?

read full post >>

This week, I chose to read Agostino over the other option based on a brief summary of this short book. I thought that Agostino sounded more interesting. This story explores the idea of virginity (both sexually and in terms of being young and inexperienced in life), awakening, love, identity, sensuality, adolescence and adulthood. I think I would have had a very different experience reading this text if I was younger or even the same age as the narrator, but reading it now as an 18 year old, I feel like an adult observing the moment of awakening of a new teenager and I honestly secretly felt relieved that I've already passed that phase of my growth. What I mainly got from him was confusion - and the teenage years are definitely some of the most confusing times of our childhoods. Emotions and hormones run high and new doors are opening, and it's when kids start to realize how much deeper life goes than the simple pleasures of children's play. 

18 isn't even that old, and I'm not saying that the hardest part of life has already passed, but when I am presented with someone like Agostino, who is just beginning this chapter of his development and whose most intimate thoughts I can hear, I feel as if I have lived much longer than he has and I feel as though I have decades more experience than he does. I remember when I was 13 years old and I was just passing into the beginnings of the adult stages of my life. Just like Agostino, I was awkward, weird, and unsure where I fit in. I wanted to please other groups of people my age, but I also wanted to stand out and be something more than I was. 

There was one quote that I liked a lot. "So he found that he had lost his original identity without acquiring through his loss another." This quote goes with the theme of identity and Agostino's sense of confusion with who he is and how his relationship with his mother has suddenly transformed. This quote makes me imagine him as something floating, unanchored and submissive to the push of the waves. It's a sense of being lost and not knowing how to realign his person according to his new perspective. I wish there was a way for someone to really help him through his struggle, especially with his odd attraction and attachment to his mom, but he's really just grappling with this on his own.

Here is the question I am presenting this week: If Agostino came to you for advice on how to navigate his confusion on his loss of identity, based on your experience as a teenager, what would you say?

read full post >>

Alberto Moravia’s Agostino depicts the confusion, family, and other interpersonal relationships, as well as the aim to reach the state of adulthood of a thirteen-year-old boy fascinatingly. In this book, it can be seen that the protagonist, Agostino, has a complex, intersective, and relatively interdependent relationship with two images that contribute to the development of […] read full post >>

This week I read Carmen Laforet's work Nada, and here are some of my post-reading feelings. 

Through this week's reading of Nada, I learned about the desolate landscape of post-war Barcelona. Through the subjective and objective perspective of the protagonist, the author takes the protagonist's family as the main object of description, creating a microcosm of the miserable post-war society at that time. The author's expression is very delicate. The article contains a lot of reports of the scenery, which highlights the eerie atmosphere of the family and shows the protagonist's rejection and fear of living here. The words of the article are straightforward, but the emotions revealed are meticulous and accurate. It's easier to understand how the author feels and how things have gone.

The protagonist comes to Barcelona to complete her studies and seeks refuge from her relatives. Still, when she lives here, she gradually gets to know everyone who lives in the family and the unusual relationships between relatives. During the time she lived here, every day she spent seemed painful and unbearable, and the family members seemed to be ghosts lacking the vitality of life under her description. As a bystander, she observes the family's disputes, the old grandmother, the terrible aunt, the grumpy uncle, and the aunt. She is entangled with her husband's brother. The constant torture of the family makes the house's atmosphere very depressing. Her campus life is not as good as imagined. However, she met a good friend, just the exchange on campus it difficult to dispel the loneliness in her heart. The relationship with a boy also ended without beginning because of his family conditions. Fortunately, In the end, Andrea had the opportunity to leave the city that had tormented her and embark on a new journey.

As I read this book, I also searched the context of the times. I can see that Bartholome was very depressed after the war. Most of the literary works advocated the existence of women in the family. The protagonist of Nada observes the flaws of this family model from the perspective of a bystander; she describes the involuntary nature of women living in such a family. This straightforward reality may awaken many women who have suffered in the family, making them aware of their situation. The protagonist's courage to embark on a new path to pursue their dreams also gave people the courage to pursue their true selves.

My question for this article is: Do you think the friendship between the protagonist and his popular college classmate is equal? It looked as if she was in a state of escort.

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This week I read Carmen Laforet's work Nada, and here are some of my post-reading feelings. 

Through this week's reading of Nada, I learned about the desolate landscape of post-war Barcelona. Through the subjective and objective perspective of the protagonist, the author takes the protagonist's family as the main object of description, creating a microcosm of the miserable post-war society at that time. The author's expression is very delicate. The article contains a lot of reports of the scenery, which highlights the eerie atmosphere of the family and shows the protagonist's rejection and fear of living here. The words of the article are straightforward, but the emotions revealed are meticulous and accurate. It's easier to understand how the author feels and how things have gone.

The protagonist comes to Barcelona to complete her studies and seeks refuge from her relatives. Still, when she lives here, she gradually gets to know everyone who lives in the family and the unusual relationships between relatives. During the time she lived here, every day she spent seemed painful and unbearable, and the family members seemed to be ghosts lacking the vitality of life under her description. As a bystander, she observes the family's disputes, the old grandmother, the terrible aunt, the grumpy uncle, and the aunt. She is entangled with her husband's brother. The constant torture of the family makes the house's atmosphere very depressing. Her campus life is not as good as imagined. However, she met a good friend, just the exchange on campus it difficult to dispel the loneliness in her heart. The relationship with a boy also ended without beginning because of his family conditions. Fortunately, In the end, Andrea had the opportunity to leave the city that had tormented her and embark on a new journey.

As I read this book, I also searched the context of the times. I can see that Bartholome was very depressed after the war. Most of the literary works advocated the existence of women in the family. The protagonist of Nada observes the flaws of this family model from the perspective of a bystander; she describes the involuntary nature of women living in such a family. This straightforward reality may awaken many women who have suffered in the family, making them aware of their situation. The protagonist's courage to embark on a new path to pursue their dreams also gave people the courage to pursue their true selves.

read full post >>

This week I read Carmen Laforet's work Nada, and here are some of my post-reading feelings. 

Through this week's reading of Nada, I learned about the desolate landscape of post-war Barcelona. Through the subjective and objective perspective of the protagonist, the author takes the protagonist's family as the main object of description, creating a microcosm of the miserable post-war society at that time. The author's expression is very delicate. The article contains a lot of reports of the scenery, which highlights the eerie atmosphere of the family and shows the protagonist's rejection and fear of living here. The words of the article are straightforward, but the emotions revealed are meticulous and accurate. It's easier to understand how the author feels and how things have gone.

The protagonist comes to Barcelona to complete her studies and seeks refuge from her relatives. Still, when she lives here, she gradually gets to know everyone who lives in the family and the unusual relationships between relatives. During the time she lived here, every day she spent seemed painful and unbearable, and the family members seemed to be ghosts lacking the vitality of life under her description. As a bystander, she observes the family's disputes, the old grandmother, the terrible aunt, the grumpy uncle, and the aunt. She is entangled with her husband's brother. The constant torture of the family makes the house's atmosphere very depressing. Her campus life is not as good as imagined. However, she met a good friend, just the exchange on campus it difficult to dispel the loneliness in her heart. The relationship with a boy also ended without beginning because of his family conditions. Fortunately, In the end, Andrea had the opportunity to leave the city that had tormented her and embark on a new journey.

As I read this book, I also searched the context of the times. I can see that Bartholome was very depressed after the war. Most of the literary works advocated the existence of women in the family. The protagonist of Nada observes the flaws of this family model from the perspective of a bystander; she describes the involuntary nature of women living in such a family. This straightforward reality may awaken many women who have suffered in the family, making them aware of their situation. The protagonist's courage to embark on a new path to pursue their dreams also gave people the courage to pursue their true selves.

My question for this article is: Do you think the friendship between the protagonist and his popular college classmate is equal? It looked as if she was in a state of escort.

read full post >>

This novella was a rollercoaster ride, to say the least. I will first note that I used this site https://booksvooks.com/agostino-pdf-alberto-moravia.html to access the missing pages if anyone is looking for another copy. Now, to the novel. There seems to be a bit of an oedipus complex in both this book, and Swann’s, though Agostino is […] read full post >>

 Agostino is a kid who never really grows up. In the beginning, I thought that Agostino was around the ages of 10-11 years old. I could picture this from how he envisioned his mother, so blessed by her presence and in awe of her beauty. He loved her like a child. He also was treated like a young child by his mother too, and the way he complained about her attention towards him and his jealousy made me think he was much younger than he actually was. Later in the book, we learn that he is 13 years old when he tells the man and his son on the boat ride. This book shows how much others' influence has on you. In the beginning, Agostino was a young, innocent, well-behaved boy who enjoyed his mother's company. After encountering the young boatman who "stole" his mother away from him, feelings of hatred, disgust, and jealousy arose within him. He could not fathom the idea of having to share his mother, especially let this man enjoy and indulge in her beauty that was only admired by him before in his mind. The young boys he met at a further down beach on his vacation changed his thoughts about women forever and himself. Agostino had no idea of his mother's relations, he saw her as a pure angel, and these boys crushed this image he looked up to instantly. Although his age or older, the boys knew more about women, power, and lustfulness. Agostino was still in his innocent age. He had not heard or even ever explored the ideas of these topics, which made his mind start to spin. These feelings confused with the image he had of his mother beforehand. He now saw her as a pleasure and a woman, not his mother. This shows us how Agostino has not grown up or matured even after learning about these "maturing" subjects. He cannot differentiate between the two and lets his feelings take over his actions he would have once considered inappropriate or looked down upon. The text shows us how unaccountable he is when he gives all his money away to his friend and is cheated by him. He put his trust into a boy he still barely knew and just accepted his words for truth without questioning anything. This once again proves that Agostino is still young and, although not as innocent, he is immature. 

My question I have after reading this text is...

Do you think if Agostino never met the boy in the cabin who brought him into the gang, that he would still have this innocence and see his mother for her motherhood and not a lustful woman? 

read full post >>

 Agostino is a kid who never really grows up. In the beginning, I thought that Agostino was around the ages of 10-11 years old. I could picture this from how he envisioned his mother, so blessed by her presence and in awe of her beauty. He loved her like a child. He also was treated like a young child by his mother too, and the way he complained about her attention towards him and his jealousy made me think he was much younger than he actually was. Later in the book, we learn that he is 13 years old when he tells the man and his son on the boat ride. This book shows how much others' influence has on you. In the beginning, Agostino was a young, innocent, well-behaved boy who enjoyed his mother's company. After encountering the young boatman who "stole" his mother away from him, feelings of hatred, disgust, and jealousy arose within him. He could not fathom the idea of having to share his mother, especially let this man enjoy and indulge in her beauty that was only admired by him before in his mind. The young boys he met at a further down beach on his vacation changed his thoughts about women forever and himself. Agostino had no idea of his mother's relations, he saw her as a pure angel, and these boys crushed this image he looked up to instantly. Although his age or older, the boys knew more about women, power, and lustfulness. Agostino was still in his innocent age. He had not heard or even ever explored the ideas of these topics, which made his mind start to spin. These feelings confused with the image he had of his mother beforehand. He now saw her as a pleasure and a woman, not his mother. This shows us how Agostino has not grown up or matured even after learning about these "maturing" subjects. He cannot differentiate between the two and lets his feelings take over his actions he would have once considered inappropriate or looked down upon. The text shows us how unaccountable he is when he gives all his money away to his friend and is cheated by him. He put his trust into a boy he still barely knew and just accepted his words for truth without questioning anything. This once again proves that Agostino is still young and, although not as innocent, he is immature. 

My question I have after reading this text is...

Do you think if Agostino never met the boy in the cabin who brought him into the gang, that he would still have this innocence and see his mother for her motherhood and not a lustful woman? 

read full post >>