Eva Sleeps (43 page)

 

I returned home on the plane, I flew over Italy in a couple of hours, my nose stuck to the window: I feel as though I have caressed the entire small peninsula I can now see from above.

I immediately went to see my mother. I told her about Vito. She looked at me, she didn't speak immediately. Then she said, “You must have missed him very much.”

Words I've been waiting for for thirty years, yet I only realize it now that I hear her utter them. I tuck them inside myself, like a treasure.

“And what about you? Have you often thought about Vito?” I then ask.

My mother does something strange: she takes her bare feet out of her house shoes, and crosses her big toes. She looks at them for a long time. “I've thought of him every night before going to sleep.”

 

I've slept over at her place. The roads are icy, there's a sudden frost. She's fallen asleep on the sofa, her head under the cushion Ruthi has embroidered, her mouth, still beautiful, half open. It almost hurts to look at her, but it's a good pain.

And I think: Gerda
schloft
. Gerda sleeps.

T
here is the time that flows around us, toward us and through us, time that conditions us and shapes us, the memory we cultivate or shake off—our History. Then, there is a sequence of places in which we live, between which we travel, where we are physically, places made of roads and buildings but also trees, horizons, temperatures, levels of atmospheric pressure, the major or minor speed with which the water of a river flows, altitude—our Geography.

These two trajectories, linked partly by fate and partly by free will, meet every instant and in every place at a spot, like in a Cartesian graphic cosmos, and the sequence of these spots forms a line, a curve and sometimes, if we're lucky, even a pattern which, if it's not harmonious, then at least it's one you can make out.

This is the shape of our lives.

 

One morning, in spring 1998, following the Schengen agreement, in the presence of Italian and Austrian authorities, the frontier barrier between the two countries at the Brenner Pass was removed. There was no longer a physical border separating Südtirol from Austria, its lost Mother Country.

It's a shame, though, that this event that had been dreamed of for almost eighty years, which had been claimed with blood and denied with military force, now had almost no more relevance in a world shaken by globalization. If History had meant to play a practical joke, the date was appropriate: the first of April.

 

Eva has made a decision. If there is another census of linguistic belonging, when she fills in the
Sprachgruppenzugehörigkeitserklärung
, in the box “ethnicity” she will write: CHINESE.

After all, her mother was born in Shanghai.

W
ithin the obvious limitations of an invented novel, I have tried to be as faithful as possible to historical events. In particular, the episode of the raid is based on episodes of the round-up that took place in Montassilone/Tesselberg (Val Pusteria) in September 1964, as reported by eyewitnesses. The Alpini officer who gave the order “shoot them all,” and the fact that that order was part of a wider strategy, was reported in an interview given by retired General Giancarlo Giudici and published in the newspaper
La Repubblica
in July 1991: he had been the young lieutenant-colonel who directed the operation—and who disobeyed the orders.

 

The chapters dedicated to Silvius Magnago are largely based on the excellent book by Hans Karl Peterlini:
Das Vermächtnis. Bekenntnisse einer politischen Legende
(Raetia, 2007).

 

In order to meet the demands of fiction, I have allowed myself to pretend that the decree signed by Umberto of Savoy regarding “acceptable” mixed marriages for Carabinieri was still in force in 1973. In reality, it was repealed in 1971. Similarly, I have brought forward by one year, to 1963, Mina's return to TV two years after the birth of her son.

 

I would like to specify that the rules of South Tyrolean dialect, especially in its written form, are much simpler compared with official German.

 

Finally, an observation on the terms “Alto Adige,” “Alto Adige resident,” “Südtirol” and “South Tyrolean”: precisely because a non-secondary element of the issue was what the Province had the right, or the obligation, to be called, the names were not used, except rarely, in any neutral way. In general, I have followed the rule according to which you say Alto Adige when you're speaking from the Italian point of view, and Südtirol from the German point of view, and which defines Alto Adige residents and South Tyroleans as respectively Italian and German speakers. But the current usage of this rule has many exceptions; therefore, in writing, I have mixed things up a bit.

And if this sometimes causes confusion, then welcome to Alto Adige/Südtirol!

This book wouldn't exist without my mother. As an Italian holidaying in Alto Adige since the late 1960s, she has given me an interest in and respect for the residents of a land of which, even nowadays, many Italians love the geography, but know nothing of the history.

Moreover, I wish to thank the many Carabinieri, in service as well as retired, veterans of the fight against Alto Adige terrorism and of peace missions abroad, who have told me stories of life in the force: “usi obbedir tacendo,” they have asked me not to mention their names; the chef Albert Pernter who opened the doors of his kingdom to me, the kitchen of the Hotel Post in Bruneck; Alois Niederwolfsgruber, for the stories of the coming out of gays in the mountains; Mirella Angelo and Giovanni Monaco for their hospitality and Sicilian-style sardines; Stefan Lechner for organizing the historical research; all the Italians, the Deutschsprachigen and the ladins who, in Alto Adige/Südtirol have always made me feel at home, most especially the Senoner family of the Putzè maso in Santa Cristina di Val Gardena, Annemi Feichter (die liebe Omi) and Dr. Manfred Walde; finally, the many friends who, with intelligent patience, embarked on the reading of the gradually evolving manuscript, providing advice, precious criticism and encouragement—too many to list them all, but they know who they are.

Many thanks—Donkschian.

Francesca Melandri is a screenwriter and novelist. This is her English language debut. She lives in Rome, Italy.

1
Rural house typical of the Italian Trentino-Alto Adige region. It generally consists of a barn, a stable and a small room for cooking food and making cheese.

2
Stove. The term also refers to the timber-paneled room at the heart of traditional Tyrolean houses, with a wood stove in the centre.

3
Godmother.

4
“Shitty contraption!”

5
Literally “catacomb schools,” illegal institutions that taught the German language (which was forbidden) and were widespread in the Alto Adige region during the Fascist era, from 1924 onwards.

6
Daddy, it's me. Gerda.

7
Quick! The bus for Merano is leaving now!

8
Committee for the Liberation of South Tyrol.

9
Belonging to a language group.

10
Prostitutes.

11
Town celebration.

12
Lieutenant in the German Alpine Infantry

13
Parish church.

14
Country band.

15
Threatened border Germans.

16
Community of people and cultures.

17
Vital space.

18
A little boy.

19
Two soldiers are asking for you.

20
“Is everything in order?”

21
Advent calendar.

22
Godfather/mother

23
Also a bit of chives . . .

24
Smoked salami.

25
Rye and wheat bread flavored with fennel, cumin seeds or coriander.

26
Turnip

27
Pan-fried potatoes.

28
Sourdough cake.

29
Viennese fried chicken.

30
Sugar for the stomach.

31
Taverns

32
Swear words.

33
Pigsty. Mess.

34
A form of greeting.

35
Grandfather.

36
“Gerda, are you in?”

37
“Let's go.”

38
“How old are you?”

39
Traditional fashion.

40
Mono-ski sled.

41
Country celebrations.

42
A vulgar term for a homosexual.

43
As above.

44
As above.

45
“Hello!”

46
Saxony, a Red worth three pfennig. It was the first stamp issued by the Kingdom of Saxony in 1850.

47
A Black. The first stamp to be issued by the Kingdom of Bavaria in 1849.

48
Dear lady.