Forbidden Notebook

On Christmas Eve, I understood for the first time that his bad mood is an accusation against his father and me. The truth is, he sometimes claims that although Michele has worked for so many years in a bank, he isn’t a businessman, meaning that he wasn’t able to get rich.

Then I catch myself standing in front of a newsstand where fashion magazines are displayed, trying on, in my imagination, the whimsical modern hat pictured on a cover. If someone approaches, I let my glance slide over to the closest daily paper and pretend to be reading the headlines of the political articles. Then, as soon as I’m alone again, I re

The rooms are very small, but maybe for that reason it seemed to me that they embraced us more closely, gathered us into a single shell. I’d always thought, too, that in many ways—the most important ones—our family was more fortunate than others. In all these years Michele and I have never fought seriously, he has always worked, I found a job when

Riccardo, taking my chin in his fingers, asked tenderly, “Tell me, what do you want to write in your diary?” Suddenly, I burst into tears. I didn’t understand what was wrong with me, except a great weariness. Seeing me cry, Riccardo turned pale and put his arms around me, saying, “I was joking, mammetta, don’t you see I was joking? I’m sorry …” The

I took advantage of the moment to tell him that yesterday Mirella insisted on asking for a new coat: she claimed that if we want to, we can afford it, because both her father and I received a bonus for Christmas. In vain I tried to make her understand that the money is already promised to other expenses—maybe she thinks we want to keep it for ourse

He said that in the presence of the children, and they looked at me with amazement. It’s terrible to think that I sacrificed my entire self to beautifully perform tasks that they consider obvious, natural.

It was a beautiful day, warm, though it was late autumn. I felt a childish pleasure walking along the streets, on the sunny side, and seeing the trees still green and people happy as they always seem to be on holidays. So I decided to take a short stroll and go to the tobacco shop in the square. Along the way I saw that a lot of people were stoppin

Mirella responded energetically that if she studies so much, it’s because she wants to start work, to be independent, and to leave home as soon as she’s of age: then she’ll be able to keep all her drawers locked without anyone being offended. She added that she keeps her diary in the drawer, so she locks it, and, besides, Riccardo does the same thi

I also liked it because it allowed me to justify the impulse of tenderness roused in me by Michele’s manner, which has remained candid and ingenuous, even now that he’s almost fifty. When he calls me “mamma” I respond in a tone that’s severe yet loving, the same I used with Riccardo when he was a child. But now I see that it was a mistake; he was t