From the Land of Green Ghosts (The Boy Who Spoke to the Wind)
I have always wondered why Italian editions do not retain the original title. It often conveys the sense of the book far better, as in the case of *From the Land of Green Ghosts*, which became, who knows why, *Il ragazzo che parlava col vento*. The title "from the land of green ghosts" neatly encapsulates the autobiography of one who, to save himself, had to forfeit his own identity through detachment from the spirits of an ancestral world made of lush fruits, rice paddies, forests, water, birds, and animals. Then again, misunderstanding must be this novel's destiny, if in his preface John Casey himself—Pascal's savior, mentor, and friend—offers this definition: > this is less a book of politics and history than a spiritual autobiography, in which, uniquely, (Pascal) writes from the perspective of a member of a Bronze Age tribal society, recently opened to the outside world, and at the same time of someone who ultimately managed to receive a Western education at a famous English university . Truly an arrogant and reductive assessment for someone who endured terrible atrocities, witnessing the material and social destruction of Burma! The novel is divided into three parts. The first part, "Tribal Idyll," depicts a tribal, agrarian world on the fringes of the great forests. > We were Padaung, we were Catholic, and we seemed to live in a world of our own, with our ceremonies and traditions. We had no sense that anything different could break in. The feeling of being safe showed me that we were living in paradise . The author describes for us, as meticulously as an anthropologist, the customs, way of life, and natural environment of the Padaung, even detailing, with a wealth of particulars curious to us, the food and the manner of cooking it. We discover ancestor worship, the formidable authority of the elders, and the spiritualistic and magical elements that characterize every moment of life. Even though Catholic—and the same holds true for Buddhists—the tribe jealously continues to preserve its traditions, all while observing the precepts of the new religion. His paternal grandmother's tales permeate Pascal's childhood: they are grim stories, like all folklore of peasant societies, yet in them animals, particularly birds, seal the fate of men. One day, the young Pascal catches an owl and wishes to cook it, but his grandmother tells him to speak to it and release it, so that one day he might call upon it for help. > Years later, when I was in the greatest danger, that memory became fraught with meaning for me . Through his involvement with the parish, Pascal receives an initial education and develops a passion for learning. He leaves the village to attend first a seminary, then university. He becomes a student, which places him in the most dynamic and politicized segment of Burmese society. Toward the regime—authoritarian, cruel, mendacious, and corrupt—Pascal has yet to take a stand. There is no political consciousness, and even the grief over the imprisonment and death of his girlfriend does not seem to translate into a deliberate taking of sides. Yet he is a student, and therefore an enemy of the regime. He must flee and hide in the jungle. The second part, "Revolution and Struggle," recounts Pascal’s experiences among the rebels, who have entrenched themselves in the border areas between Burma and Thailand. Through Pascal’s pen, we witness countless atrocities; suffice it to say that Burmese soldiers advance through minefields—laid, moreover, by themselves—by herding beaten, terrorized, and starving civilians ahead of them, clearing a path through bodies torn apart by explosions. Such is the cruelty that even > the animals and birds, which regularly drank from the river, fled, leaving only the human beings trapped in a fit of madness . The third part, "Rescue," recounts how Pascal managed to escape to Thailand and reach England, where he would become a professor of English literature. The story has a happy ending, yet there is a disturbing revelation. In Cambridge, at a dinner party at the home of English friends, he learns that he was singled out for rescue because years earlier his hosts had attended a circus performance of "giraffe women"—Padaung women with elongated necks adorned with metal rings; in short, Western man delights in preserving specimens of rare and endangered species. Yet is Pascal aware of this? No, because as the closing lines tell us, by now his dreams are > images all jumbled together, the elements overlapping. Snow might fall on the jungles, or palm trees grow on the Alps. The visions are often blurred by mist . It is a long novel, dominated by a flat narrative style incapable of conveying sensations and emotions. It is as if he were a reporter investigating, describing, filing an account. While the facts undeniably speak for themselves, it is not the writing that grips us; it is the history of Burma itself. It is no coincidence that the narrative engages the reader in the second part, as the tempo accelerates and the episodes of war and violence cannot fail to shatter us. Yet even here, the narrating "I" and protagonist, Pascal, appears almost as a bystander, a social scientist. Could it be that the author is forced to write in a language not his own? Or is this apparent detachment a psychological shield to survive, to defend against memory, against a destructive existential grief? Why skip it? The book is worth reading only if one harbors a deep interest in the landscape and history of Burma.