It has been
quite a while since I have opened this book to further read into the lines of a
novel set in a city very dear to me-to find moments of reflection in words
perhaps not meant to be read in such a way, yet so capable of being experienced
in this manner. As I sit with the book
opened up on my dining room table with a warm mug of hot cocoa, I patiently
read, searching for a written moment among its yellowing pages upon which to
pause. I find the following:
"Swiftly, with the familiar little rocking motion,
I go on in the darkness, and the walls on either side seem given up to the
dead. There is fear, and tragedy and
danger everywhere-but this, too, is Venice…"
“Tragedy and
danger” alludes to things occurring in the past and future, respectively. "Fear" is a reference to a present feeling. And so, as the narrator ventures in his
gondola into the darkness of the city, he refers to all of time in its darkest moments. He states that “this, too, is Venice.” Indeed if we are to think of Venice and its
wall as “given up to the dead,” we accept that places capable of holding in
their streets, canals, and piazzas, our dreams also contain within them a sense
of loss. To love a place is to know
this, and accept this. To love Venice, to
go to such a mysterious place is to be vulnerable to all that it may have to
offer, good and bad.
The novel seems
to be slowly taking on a sinister turn.
