'The Albanian Virgin' in Open Secrets, kind of takes the reader around in a circle. It is about a woman, Claire, who owns a bookstore and how she meets all sorts of different people along the way. She talks about and describes how she brings in new ways of thinking to the towns people by not buying the books on the lists, by selling poetry and "good" literature. Along with Claire's story, there is Charlotte's story about Lottar. Lottar travels with her guide and when he guide gets killed she needs to be nursed back to health. After she is, she is adopted into the "tribe" and is up to be sold to a Muslim. The Franciscan priest finds out about this and stops it just as soon as it happened and turns her into a propetual virgin. Basically she is allowed the same status in society as men. The priest takes her with him to go see the bishop and after she goes to the consulate and leaves. Charlottes story is also comprised of her being an "ex-scavenger" with her husband Gjurdhi. She ends up in the hospital and eventually is checked out by Claire and they both disappear.
Within ALL of the stories, there are secrets. One major one that sticks out to me, is, Is Charlotte really Lottar with a changed name? Is she really proposing this idea for a movie script and telling it in third person when in reality it happened to her? This secret is kept from the reader. I feel as though Claire knows the answer to this secret. When the description is given of Lottar becoming a virgin with all the Crucifixes around her, it is connected in a sense to when Gjurdhi comes into Claire's bookstore (pg. 95) and by the end is describing and trying to sell her his crucifix (pg. 97). This made me believe that if Charlotte really WAS Lottar, then possibly Gjurdhi was involved with her becoming a virgin as well, or wore the Crucifix in memory of her while she was in the hospital. Also I feel as though the script would not be so indepth with details that seem so real if it was not based off of real life experiences.
"The kula was a great, rough stone house with a stable below and the living quarters above. A veranada ran all the way around, and there would always be an old woman sitting there, with a bobbin contraption that flew like a bird from one hand to the other and left a trail of shiny black braid, mile after mile of black braid, which was the adornment of all the men's trousers..." (pg. 87 continuing until the top of pg. 88). With a woman of Charlotte's age (or the age that the author makes us believe Charlotte is) I have a hard time believing that descriptions like those can come right off the top of her head, without anything in front of her reminding her of what she wanted to propose as a movie script.
I believe that the major secret in this story is whether or not Charlotte or even Gjurdhi were a part of the story of Lottar. I think that it is not a vital piece of information for the reader in order to understand the story, I believe that it would help out though seeing things seem to just run themselves into a circle sentence after sentence.
2 comments:
i think that Charlotte definately was Lottar. One page 82 when lottar is being nursed back to health in the hut the cross later referenced by Claire as being Gjurdhi's outside the bookstore is described by Lottar as being the Franciscan priests.
"...a wooden crucifix that a man was trying to get her to kiss. The man was a priest, a Franciscan."
Also, the priest is identified as being the man she calls out for as "Xoti! Xoti!" which means master or leader. At this point in the story we know she has feelings for the priest and i believe he didnt show his feelings for her because he couldnt considering he was a PRIEST. He does show he cares for her and doesnt want her married to another man - muslim or not when he suggests the crazy idea of her just being a virgin - to have noone rather than someone who doesnt deserve her in his eyes. I dont feel he would have easily suggested this for another woman in the village. His waiting for her at the other end of the dock at Trieste proves to me that he left the village and went with Lottar, or Charlotte to live in the civilized world. He still has the cross as Gjurdhi and is an outsider as one would be coming from such a tribe to current civilization.
I agree. I think that Charlotte is Lottar and she is telling a descript narrative about her own life yet no one can find out that it is hers because she was sentenced to be a virgin. She changed her name and fell in love. Now she wants to tell her own story. I think that this secret is kept from the readers to symbolize that no one can know that she was once a virgin. This is a secret that will never be discovered.
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