Hello
Gentle Reader
Light
is complicated and convoluted. Light
changes with the seasons, and its mood shifts with the weather. It wears
different tints and costumes for every time and occasion. There is the virginal
and fresh glow of a pink dawn; the bursting flames of an evening dress with
sunset; the mourning veil of dusk; the departing sadness of twilight. In spring
the light is green and new; ever quick to bud and refresh; come summer it’s a
haze of lazy nights, and a scorching scorn of a sweltering afternoon; in the autumn
its matured and cooler, enjoying maturation and freedom; by winter its crisp,
cold and clear, with sparkling individual words littering the landscape. Light,
however, changes from bulb to tube. Light itself ripples beneath the unsettled
surface of water. Light twinkles with break neck speed; but dims and dulls at
an equally competitive haste. This being said, light is everywhere, and is
taken for granted or overlooked. Light as most will testify too, is only
noticed when it begins to slip away; which is at its pinnacle of noticeability
in winter. Yet even then, it’s not the light we mourn; but rather the day. In
Antonio Moresco’s novel: “Distant Light,” – light is treated in both a literal
and metaphorical sense. It is a physical construct or phenomena which can
tangibly be perceived. However, what causes the light in some circumstances is
yet another area of concern.
Antonio
Moresco is one of Italy’s most renowned writers, currently being published.
Moresco has been compared to the American writers Thomas Pychon and Don
DeLillo. Despite these comparisons Moresco has not always, been a well-known or
read writer. Antonio Moresco did not see publication of any of his works until
later in his career; and to this day is more known for his trilogy, “L'increato,”
more than anything else. Born in 1947; he did not see publication until 1993;
but since then Moresco had steadily and prolifically been producing work after
work. “Distant Light,” is his first publication in English.
“Distant
Light,” is a short novel, which could be read quickly on a particularly dour
spring day filled with rain. It could be read in the shade, on a sweltering
summer afternoon. It could be breezed through in the early evening in autumn.
It can be devoured in a dark night of the soul, in an insomnia filled winter night.
Despite being literally a short novel, “Distant Light,” is a condensed book
whose context lingers long afterwards it’s been devoured, shelved and left. The
story is poignant, and raises greater questions, than it does answer them. The
novel is both an ethereal ghost story, as well as a bewildering light filled
science fiction novel.
The
nameless narrator of “Distant Light,” is a recluse; for reasons in which they
are not entirely made clear. However there is slight and hesitant inclination, to
suggest the narrator belonged to the army, and the experience must have left
him in rough shape, in which he seeks refuge in solitude; in solitary
confinement, befit for an individual who fantasizes about the rapture or end of
the world happening from his abandoned village. Despite this solitary
existence, the narrator is not without his own thoughts and nature for company.
He often asks the natural world abstract questions. Such as:
[
a question to wasps]
“But
why are you always so angry?” I ask. “Why do you drop headfirst into the pulp
of unpicked fruit that’s rotting on the trees in this deserted unearthly place?
So that sometimes, when I split one open to eat it, I find one of you inside,
and you fly off in a rage, covered all over with dead liquids and the juices in
which you were wallowing. Where do you live, where do you sleep? What happens,
day and night, in your savage nests?”
“But
they never answer?”
It
is not just the angry and anxious wasps he asks these questions to. He asks
trees how they can continue to live despite parts of them dying; he inquires
about fireflies and their lamps; he ponders air roots and why they exist. Few
if any respond. The only natural element which sees it fit to respond are
birds, specifically swallows; but now and then another bird adds its tune to
the chorus:
[
with regards to the: “creaking door bird,” ]
“There’s
a bird somewhere down below, in the woods in front of my house, that sounds
like a door creaking.”
[
. . . ]
“And
you, what kind of bird are you?”
It
made no reply, but I imagined instead that it did reply:
“I’m
the creaky door bird.”
“But
why dom’t I ever see you? I search among the foliage when I hear your sound,
but I don’t see you . . .”
“Isn’t
it just the same with creaky doors? You turn around and look and no one’s
there.”
“But
someone will have made them creak, even if they’ve then quickly hidden
themselves so they can’t be seen!”
“Sometimes
there’s no one, it’s just the wind.”
“So
you’re the wind then?”
“No,
I’m the door that’s made to creak by the wind.”
“So
why do I sometimes hear you when there’s no wind?”
“I’m
the bird that also makes the wind creak.”
Nature
for the pondering narrator is generally his only source of company, with the
sole exception of the sporadic moments; he is required to go down to the nearby
village to purchase food. Nature is a poetic companion, but also a chaotic
construct, one in which meaning and purpose is not explicitly outlined or seen.
Yet for the narrator, this ‘unearthly,’ and often savage place is a perfect
place in which one could retire to, in which they chose to: disappear; as those
are his intentions, by his opening statement of the book.
Still,
for the anguish ridden narrator, the twinkling light across the gorge, becomes
consuming, filled with questions, inquiries, and ponderings. To the point in
which he asks locals their thoughts on what could possibly be an explanation
for the light across the way. Perhaps, a likeminded individual has also joined
the desire to disappear, as our narrator; but as the villagers pointed out,
this is not the case. No one lives in those parts of the mountains, as the
place has remained abandoned and reclaimed by the savage vegetation. This
leaves only one theory to be proposed to the narrator: extraterrestrials. The
theory of alien life, and their lights, sends him to a odd individual, a
shepherd of sorts, who is described as an Albanian, who has been documenting
alien sightings and odd lights within the region. The Albanian offers his own
story of a shell less egg of light, which had taken his sheep and goats, and
would later return them; but he himself had saw the strange egg of light,
before it too disappeared into the unknowable void of space.
The
short detour from poetic and surreal inquiries into nature was brief and short;
but not renounced completely. At first it appeared that Moresco had fallen into
some strange mixture of science fiction, while asking the question: Are we
alone in the universe; or does other intelligent life out there also exist. Yet
rather than elucidate further, Moresco jumps back on the already beaten path,
and continues for the most part with a realistic narrative; but deviations do
eventually happen again, but this time, not as a science fiction trope; rather
a ghost story; and in this ghost story, Antonio Moresco begins to ask questions
about life and death, as well as meaning and purpose in a world in which we are
well aware of our own life eventually coming to its eventual end.
The
living and the dead co-exist in the savage vegetal and foliage covered world of
“Distant Light.” However it’s a poetic account of one man attempting to
disappear and also find his place in an increasingly savage world; amongst
angry wasps, skittish badgers, and damaged dogs. It’s a novel where questions
are posed, and answers are rarely given; and companionship comes in unlikely
shapes and forms. “Distant Light,” is a well-crafted novel, which should be
read slowly in order to appreciate the poetic encounters of nature, but also
with the thoughts given to the concept of death, and how the living and the
dead co-exist. Though, at times eccentric and odd, “Distant Light,” is also
rewarding to the end.
Thank-you
For Reading Gentle Reader
Take
Care
And
As Always
Stay
Well Read
M.
Mary
