Hey guys, third time. I feel like I've improved a tad. There's still many many more essays to come. ANY COMMENTS+HELP IS APPRECIATED.
Maria’s depleted bike, ‘worn by the stones’ and ‘broken glasses’ induces a feeling of inescapable poverty. Michele’s reluctance to tell of a boy in desperate need of medical attention sets the setting of a family familiar to suffering.
Michele criticises Skull’s intellect and childish behaviour on several occurrences throughout the text. Ammaniti portrays Skull as a powerful figure through symbolism suggesting, ‘Remo to be his squire.’ Michele, contrary to his previous objections to Skull’s propaganda, takes moral comfort in his compliance to the ambiguous ethics Skill has universally installed stating, ‘Finders keepers, Skull had decided.’ In the wider context of the novella, this is metaphoric as ‘the mafioso’ or ‘corruption’ is symbolized in Skull. Michele, like his father, justifies his own wrong-doings through the colloquialism ‘everyone is doing it.’ His morals are compromised to suit him and make things more favourable. This is a reflection of the level of immature thinking Michele is at. Michele has an unexplored deeper level of understanding in his subconscious as he proceeds to liken the boy to an object to remove his ‘emotional baggage.’
The second passage begins by exemplifying the family’s poverty. Maria states, ‘I took my glasses...broken,’ as if were an ‘everyday occurrence.’ The fact that the notion that Maria will go without vision is taken seriously further encapsulates the family’s poverty. Papa is disconnected from the children. He attempts a joke but the children are totally dumbfounded suggesting there is little communication between them. Papa’s unexpected presentation of ‘expensive glasses’ is conspicuous as it is in the midst of many financial problem the family faces, including Maria’s necessary operation. This imparts and aura of secrecy within the family suggesting that something is hidden. Ammaniti’s subtle hint at apparent inequality within the family suggests that Papa does not fully appreciate and value his children believing himself to be ‘more equal’ to quote George Orwell.
Michele describes his father as a small man who vanishes behind the wheel of his truck. Metaphorically, Papa is a symbol of a ‘pawn’ juxtaposed by the large powerful truck, a symbol his work, highlighting Michele’s apparent fondness of Papa at this stage of the book and his disappointment at the long periods of time he leaves for. Ammaniti’s use of imagery, ‘He smelt of Nazionale...cologne,’ suggests that Michele has a misrepresentation of his father and that his real vile self is concealed by a false, masking persona. Michele, portrayed as having an ignorant view of his father, is a symbol of child-like innocence. The passage serves to highlight that Michele is in his formative period and is an immature thinker. Ammatini is portraying a boy on the cusp of a realisation that not every adult in the world is good.
Michele's morals and maturity develop throughout the text. Both passages serve to highlight the naive nature and ignorant views that Michele holds on his father. He has still not made the realisation that ‘bad’ is real and still associates evil only with monsters and distant beings. Ammaniti uses Michele as a symbol of raw-morals that children hold and pardons them for their mistakes and they ‘don’t know any better.’
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