Thoughts on Prologue of MY BRILLIANT FRIEND by Elena Ferrante

“Lila was overdoing it as usual, I thought.

She was expanding the concept of trace of all proportion. She wanted not only to disappear herself, now, at the age of sixty-six, but also eliminate the entire life she had left behind.

I was really angry.

We’ll see who wins this time, I said to myself. I turned on the computer and began to write – all the details of our story, everything that still remained in my memory.”

Immediately after we read this, the page is turned and we see CHILDHOOD; Elena’s spiteful telling of their history begins without hesitation. There are several virtues to this beginning. The most jarring is certainly the discovery that neither Lila nor Elena, our beloved protagonists which we were somehow rooting for before even starting the prologue, are very nice. Lila has left her only child is anguish; Elena is equally cold. This will be an honest glimpse into the personalities of the girls, as the story gives no pause in showing us their competitive and blunt behavior. Their first grand adventure as friends is simply the result of them throwing each other’s dolls through a grate.

Beyond a subversion of expectations, the prologue provides us with essential insight into the relationship our protagonists share and, better yet, gives life to the narration. As the story continues, there is no doubt that it is the result of a sixty-something year old Elena typing furiously away, backtracking to give necessary context, winding into tangents within tangents, reaching into the mind of her younger self, and filling in the gaps however she deems necessary. This in turn leads to the speculation on how much of the Elena in this telling is like the Elena in the prologue, seeing as our narrator is tangible enough to be felt in every word and human enough to lie, which of course makes us wonder how much of the Elena in the prologue is like the Elena listed as the author.

As a work of autofiction, the distinction is invisible, which provides a rush of excitement. Everything that is said is perfectly plausible; Don Achilles could exist comfortably in the mind of a child, the walk to the ocean may seem long for some children but possible if properly motivated, it could have even been stretched by the perspective of the young mind. The words then take on a new value. They are not hardened fact, as an autobiography, held threateningly to the standards of truth, nor are they the unattainable whimsy of fantasy, available only in realms built on falsities. The words instead have the exhilarating risk of being true, and the freedom of still being fiction. They captivate.

Works Cited

Ferrante, Elena. My Brilliant Friend. Europa Editions, 2019.