Ferrante-Addendum

I suddenly realized that I had not provided the slightest idea what the Ferrante book “My Brilliant Friend was all about. So briefly…

It is a story about two friends, Elena and Lila, the “brilliant friend.” It begins in the 1950s, in a poor neighborhood on the outskirts of Naples—a neighborhood of rough, tough streets and often feuding families and fights between adolescent boys. We follow the two girls from childhood, through their schools, their relationships with boys, through adolescence, and they learn to rely on each other as their lives diverge and converge. To quote one review: “They are likewise the embodiments of a nation undergoing momentous change. Through the lives of these two women, Ferrante tells the story of a neighborhood, a city, and a country as it is transformed in ways that, in turn, also transform the relationship between her protagonists, the unforgettable Elena and Lila.”