Roma it is a city of enchantment. Its beauty is hard to put into words. It's hard not to fall in love with it. It is a place capable of awakening in the soul feelings complex, sometimes extreme. Rome is the eternal city, and therefore by its very nature somehow ineffable. Perhaps to understand it a little better it would be useful to try to “[…] To tell it as a love story, because at the beginning no one thinks that even that word, love, will run out". These are the words of Nadia Newfoundland, born in 1978, originally from Messina and that a Roma has lived for almost twenty years. Words contained in the collection of short stories "Like a love story " published by Giulio Perrone.
A text in which we find echoes of the themes dear to her (already breathed in in Farewell to the Ghosts, finalist at the Strega Award 2019): assenza, lack and naturally Ghosts. The protagonists of the ten stories are ten female voices. Interrupted women, frozen on the edge of a decision, sometimes alien to their own lives. Delicate characters who dance with failure and cast a lively look at the theater of this dance: Rome with its smells, its shadows, its intoxicating contradictions.
Those told by Terranova are women in suspension. To move them, to do them fluctuate, is the search for an indefinite sense of freedom. They come to imagine new lives through the eyes of others. And they end up understanding, more or less consciously, that to lull, or be lulled by a semblance of serenity, it is sometimes necessary to get lost. And it's not that complicated in an endless city. The writing of the Terranova involves with naturalness that smacks of lived experience. The narration is clear, very enjoyable.
In this short exchange, the writer tells us about her relationship of amazement and love with the city that adopted her many years ago.
Why did you choose to set your stories in the city of Rome?
I have lived here for almost twenty years, I have accumulated many stories that have never ceased to excite me and that I felt the need to tell.
You describe Rome "as a love story", what kind of love story exactly?
Catastrophic, dense, surprising.
She is originally from Messina and now lives in this huge city. What is your relationship with her?
I live it every day with a feeling full of amazement and conflict at the same time.
Where do you get the inspiration for your characters?
Mainly from the suburbs, from marginal characters, from ordinary people. They are the latter source of interesting and not ordinary stories.
Is there a story you are most fond of?
"Via della Devozione" because it is dedicated to Andrea Olivero, a trans woman killed at Termini station.
His characters are in search of happiness. What does it mean to you to be happy?
In another book I wrote: "There is no happiness, there are happy moments".
In one of the stories he refers to social networks. Do you also think that they are turning us into narcissists who flaunt fake happiness to audiences of strangers?
No, I don't think that. I think we all project something onto each other, and that it is sometimes difficult to really listen to and look at each other in the mirror.
Cities find meaning in people who live there. What do you think?
I'm curious about people, always.
How does a city become a source of inspiration for the writer?
You can write about any city, the important thing is how.
What was it like to be part of the five finalists of the Premio Strega?
Beautiful experience that gave me a lot because it made me grow artistically and as a person.
Featured photo by Carlos Ibáñez on Unsplash
