Ties
Domenico Starnone, Trans. by Jhumpa Lahiri
Rave
Positive
Mixed
Pan
Ties
Domenico Starnone, Trans. by Jhumpa Lahiri
Rave
Positive
Mixed
Pan
Rave
Positive
Mixed
Pan
...the leanest, most understated and emotionally powerful novel by Domenico Starnone.
Ties is one half of a collaboration far more intriguing than co-authorship of individual books: a riveting dialogue on marriage conducted, on the page, between one novelist and another.
Starnone’s engrossing and masterful story of the Minori family, told from a trifecta of perspectives — the betrayed wife’s letters in the opening section, the doddering husband’s viewpoint in the middle, the closing section recounted by the downtrodden adult daughter — is almost too impeccable a work. Shaped and polished as meticulously as an Etruscan urn, no portion, no narrative ligament, no single word feels out of place.
Starnone’s work is subtle and nuanced, and, in Lahiri’s elegant translation, his prose is fluid and clear. It is by no means comprehensive. You will not hear from all sides; you will hear hardly anything from Lidia, Aldo’s 'other woman,' for example. The book is a snapshot, a sliver of a marriage. It is as vivid and devastating as anything you will read this year. A slim, stunning meditation on marriage, fidelity, honesty, and truth..
Aldo tells his side of the affair. The problem is that he tells and tells, displaying little self-awareness and seemingly expecting sympathy he may not have earned. Anna, Vanda and Aldo’s daughter, middle-aged and scarred, like her feckless brother, by the breakup and the resumed marriage, is no picnic either—angry, manipulative, greedy. Though Starnone’s willingness to let his characters—particularly Aldo—incriminate themselves can be read as writerly confidence, the novel, despite being slim, feels long..