Elena Ferrante Analysis

My new favorite word is suffering. I endeavor to use it in my writing and in everyday life as much as possible. This is because I’m reading Elena Ferrante’s delicious novel quartet, which recounts the tale of a complex friendship between two women from a very young age into their sixties. The story takes place in Naples, Italy. The neighborhood is run down, the girls’ clothing, drab; but the characters’ emotions are so alive! And the narrator’s repeated use of the word suffering strikes such a chord.

The protagonist brings to life her best friend, a fantastically drawn character, whose intense ideas and shocking acts she often interprets as a lack of devotion. This causes the narrator to suffer. As a good book can, it rouses experiences from my own life—a friend who failed to support me at a crucial time; a definitive silence, enduring
Her reasons traveled with her to her grave. I suffered from that. And then there was that former soulmate, who went around telling really tall tales about me. When we broke up, my heartsickness settled in for a long, long while. I can only describe that sorrow as suffering. By the time her rumors came to light, I didn’t even care anymore, thank goodness! Nevertheless, It’s impossible for me to forget how I vowed to never let anyone else in. And how I reversed course, only to be disappointed again. This is life—joy, pain, learning, forgetting, and starting all over again.
Although I am happy not to claim suffering as an overriding constant in my life, I love it when it kidnaps me for a time. Because it whips up all this deep stuff that makes me feel in a real way. It takes you beyond your petty, superficial worries into a tough place that makes you consider and re-evaluate yourself, your motives and proclivities. And that’s good stuff.

I hate it when I suffer. But I love it too. Does that make me a drama queen? Oh, my! Perish the