NOTE: Free essay sample provided on this page should be used for references or sample purposes only. The sample essay is available to anyone, so any direct quoting without mentioning the source will be considered plagiarism by schools, colleges and universities that use plagiarism detection software. To get a completely brand-new, plagiarism-free essay, please use our essay writing service.
One click instant price quote
... seemed to fade away from me, to lose their power to impress me with their presence. But though my mind was filled with images of America, of tall buildings and wide green fields. I could not believe in the truth of them; and all I could see clearly of the future was a kind of limitless space that took shape in my head as the sea, and journey into this space that took direction not from its destination but from its point of departure. My mother and I will melt now into an endless freedom. (Lives of the Saints, 165, 201) That's how Vittorio reacted to their departure to America. He was glad to escape from the atmosphere they lived in.
He didn't know what was waiting for them oversea but he was hoping that their lives would be better. Comparing to the novel In a Glass House, after years spent in university away from the family, Vittorio felt like a stranger around relatives and his father. He could not imaging himself living like his father did, working on the farm, taking care of the family business. He was drawn away from shadowy alliances and misunderstanding with his father and unstopping arguments. In general he did not want to live the same life he lived prior to his departure to university, in his mind he saw a different future. Vittorio chose to leave his father and go to Africa to teach English.
This sense of making a tiny, other life in some unknown place as if starting from the scratch. The next weeks I passed in a kind of dream, set now on this future that had somehow been conjured out of nothing. The world took on an impermanence, everything already compared to the future's imagined foreignness, the buildings and shops, the traffic lights, the strange organization of things, so arbitrary, roads and highways and malls, the endless civilized neatness of suburbs. (In a Glass House, 268) Vittorio imagined how things are going to be in Africa, he wanted to start a new life, like he said, from the scratch. The author was using similar concept in Lives of the Saints, when he described Vittorio's thoughts about America.
It is possible that by changing locations Vittorio expected to find an environment where he would be accepted, where he would find himself as well. Acceptance by peers and his view of himself as a person are another important aspects of formation of a character. Most of teenagers were doing crazy things, to show off, to be better than somebody else or to fit in a certain group of people. Some of them were doing sports, participating in some events and being a part of some school comity, but some teens preferred to skip school, smoke and fight.
Similar behavior was reflected in Vittorio. Often Vittorio and his friend were skipping school on the mountain, smoking stolen, from friend's father cigarettes, and getting into fights. It was going on until Vittorio'd friend was taken from school to work on the farm, as a result, Vittorio got lonely and ignored. Later on, Vittorio got into fight with a local gang member.
Either it was in order to protect himself or just show off; Vittorio forgot that there was no one to defend him or to help him. It was obvious that he did not fit in. Another rather stupid than brave scene was when Vittorio agreed to go on the mountain with a gang to smoke. Vittorio was so overwhelmed with the idea that he can be one of the members, and blind enough not to see that this was all a set up, he had done something that he should be ashamed of. "To become a member, you have to show us your bird, and then you have to put it in the hole and move it up and down fifty times, and then you are the member. " (Lives of the saints, 125) Fortunately, Fabrizio helped Vittorio, but instead being thankful, Vittorio was full of hatred toward his friend. " He had ruined my chances now, and I felt myself flush with anger and hate for Fabrizio. " (Lives of the Saints, 127) Some other things happened in Italy, but most of Vittorio's imlay attempts were made in Canada, when he was older. In his university year he got into the wrong crowd, just wanting to fit in one of the hippies group. Their regular ceremony was smoking a joint.
Small step at a time Vittorio was a regular customer of a guy in a group, it felt good, because he actually was one of them. "I took a long drag... I felt comforted by being there in the cluttered intimacy of Verne's room, by his own mute acceptance of me, the sense of having entered somehow into the residence's secret life. " (In a Glass House, 225, 227) The desire to belong somewhere was probably caused by some past experience that Vittorio hid deep inside of him. The same reason caused him to be afraid of letting someone into his life. In Italy this fear wasn't really present in comparison to Canada, when he got older, because he had his mother, who loved him and he had his friend. With every year he spent with his father and being alone most of the times, Vittorio isolated himself from everybody, seems like he was scared of being hurt. And even if someone was trying to make a contact with him he was pushing that person away, not caring at all, like there was an empty space inside him.
This loneliness and avoidance of being involved with people grew and finally it came to a climax. Once Vittorio got to university things took a very ugly shape. He spoke to no one, he was spending most of the time in his room either smoking up or sleeping. He avoided people even when they tried to talk to him. "The people who were friendly with me were exactly the ones I after wards avoided, afraid they'd finally see into this falseness in me.
Sought out always the back corners of classrooms to be close to the exits. I spoke to no one, emerging from my room only for classes. I started sleeping incessantly, twelve, thirteen, fourteen hours a day. " (In a Glass House, 222 - 223) Soon after this Vittorio's thoughts were directed toward suicide. The time he spent in his room, he was thinking about the best way of killing himself. He ones came too close, but then the thought about the half-family stopped him. "I began to think seriously of killing myself, had a thousand times planned out its every detail. Went so far once as to remove the screen from the window in my room, stood for a moment, but it was the thought of my family that seemed to keep me from it. " (In a Glass House, 224) Vittorio was strong enough to overcome his psychological problems, he found help, and successfully graduated from university.
He went trough a long way of discovering himself. It all started from his mothers death and went on through his life with the father and then alone. A huge contribution to all his psychological problems was given by the family in Italy and in Canada; these families were characterized by disorder, anger and arguments. Nino Ricci wrote two absolutely unforgettable novels Lives of the Saints, and In a Glass House. He wanted a reader to follow two decades of Vittorio Innocent's life within Italian community in Italy as well as an immigrant in Canada. He emphasizes on the effect of the family on development of a child and how an atmosphere and relationships inside the family can build a basis for ones life.
That's how relationships among the family members, effort to forget present life, and a wish to fit in, can influence an existence of a person. "One of the most basic issues we face in our lives is the feeling of failure or guilt. I come from a minority group, families where F stood for feedback or flow and not failure. F's on a test meant a failed test and not a failure as a human being. F's helped me find my place in the universe because the family attitude was, "It was meant to be. " And now we would see what good would come of this event. " (King Solomon) Bibliography:
Free research essays on topics related to: glass, lives of the saints, psychological problems, vittorio, saints
Research essay sample on Lives Of The Saints Psychological Problems
