- Free Day

by Ines Cagnati

Other authorsLiesl Schillinger (Translator)

Paperback, 2019

Status

Available

Call number

843.914

Genres

General Fiction

All Topics

Fiction

Collection

Wishlist_SW

Publication

NYRB Classics (2019), 160 pages

Description

In the marshy, misty countryside of southwestern France, fourteen-year-old Galla rides her battered bicycle from the private Catholic high school she attends on scholarship to the rocky, barren farm where her family lives. It's a journey she makes every two weeks, forty miles round trip, traveling between opposite poles of ambition and guilt, school and home. Galla's loving, overwhelmed, incompetent mother doesn't want her to go to school; she wants her to stay at home, where Galla can look after her neglected little sisters, defuse her father's brutal rages, and help with the chores. What does this dutiful daughter owe her family, and what does she owe herself? In In s Cagnati's haunting, emotionally and visually powerful novel Free Day, which won France's Prix Roger Nimier in 1973, Galla makes an extra journey on a frigid winter Saturday to surprise her mother. As she anticipates their reunion, stopping often to pry caked, gelid mud off her bicycle wheels, she mentally retraces the crooked path of her family's past and the more recent map of her school life as a poor but proud student. Galla's rich, dense interior monologue blends with the landscape around her, building a powerful portrait of a girl who yearns to liberate herself from the circumstances that confine her, without losing their ties to her heart.… (more)

User reviews

LibraryThing member DieFledermaus

A spare and brutal account of the life of a young girl from a family of Italian immigrants barely making a living on a stony farm in southern France. The concentrated story follows 14-year-old Galla as she rides her bicycle 20 miles from her high school to the family’s isolated house. There are a

few “events”, but most of the book is Galla’s thoughts on her family and school life. The author expertly captures the bitter cold of the day and the claustrophobic poverty of Galla’s childhood. Cagnati’s life was similar to Galla’s, and the narrative feels depressingly realistic. Even the introduction and the interview with Cagnati at the end seem to hint that the author always felt like an outsider, even though this book won the Prix Roger Nimier in 1973. Galla narrates in a straightforward voice, describing her abusive father, her sad and beaten-down mother, the sisters she hates and those she loves and her status as an outcast at the school–she’s a poor scholarship student who is disruptive and contemptuous of the teachers who look down on her. She casually describes stealing from stores and her classmates and all sorts of violence–the kind that is standard on the farm, her father’s actions, and a horrific accident. She also, at various times, wishes death and destruction on different family members, the townspeople, and some classmates and teachers. Occasionally, there are some happy memories, but they are few and far between. Galla is expertly characterized, and the bike–which she needs to get back and forth–almost comes to be a character too. Although the actual plot is straightforward–Galla goes to visit her family on her day off and then goes back–there is a mystery that lurks in the background of her musings. Overall, an involving if not always pleasant read.

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