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Before I talk about Maria Barbal’s ‘Stone in a Landslide’ I want to mention how much I already love the book’s publisher, the recently established Peirene Press. When I first heard about its motto: "Bored watching films? For a fascinating night in: Sink into a two-hour book!" I thought it sounded a little gimmicky, but their emerging, inclusive marketing strategy and fantastic website blew all my doubts away. Like Snowbooks Peirene’s web design and blog are fun, informative and easily accessible. Like Persephone, Peirene engages with its readers views by putting up snippets about each book from bloggers and readers. I’m not just saying that because they gave me a lovely book to review, it is true. The book begins with the narrator, a Catalonian woman called Conxa remembering her large, poor family, who lived in the Catalan Pyrenees:
‘Anyone could see there were a lot of us at home. Someone had to go. I was the fifth of six children – Mother used to say I was there because God wanted me to be there and you have to take what He sends you. The eldest was Maria who, more than Mother ran the house. Josep was the son and heir and Joan was going into the church. We three youngest were told a hundred times we were more of a burden than a blessing.’ .
Conxa is sent away from home when she is young, because her family can’t afford so many children. Her aunt and uncle are childless and need help running their farm, so Conxa goes to live with them. She isn’t able to see her parents or siblings often and while she is naturally sad at first, she becomes really happy with her aunt and her life fills with love. As the years go by she makes a good friend, finds a husband and begins to build her own family.
Have you ever watched one of those documentaries where people who lived through a major historical event talk about how their everyday lives were, during that time? These people radiate such naturalness as they talk about a time of great historical significance from an intimate perspective. The narrative tone of ‘Stones in a Landslide’ feels like these kind of documentaries, as Conxa simply relates the story of her life in quiet, unflappable prose. Conxa’s story is an ordinary tale of farm work, domesticity and village life, but the simplicity with which Conxa relates the normality of life is what makes the book so involving. The chance to peep into a life’s real flow is irresistible, so by avoiding any clanging sound of artifice or over invention Barbel compels her readers to sit quietly and read, without ever looking up. Conxa’s narrative voice is composed of straightforward, descriptive detail, but it never feels like Barbal makes her reveal specific, or representative details. What emerges in Conxa’s narrative is everything as she naturally remembers seeing it, rather than a story constructed about her life (which sounds like and is a contradiction).
Barbal works skillfully with time and pacing, ensuring that the book doesn’t get bogged down in too many everyday details, even as it reveals a picture of normal life on a farm. The narrative hurries time along, cherry picking events and the timeline it creates of Conxa’s life is highly constructed, excised of any long patches of dullness you might expect to find in an average life (which is part of the contradiction between the natural sounding life story Barbal creates and how she accomplishes the effect she wants). Despite that it feels like a full account of a life, not one snipped up into only the most entertaining vignettes.
Barbel also aids the construction of a natural feeling story and narrative voice by describing common events readers will feel familiar with, such as childhood isolation, marriage and the formation of a family. Her technique is similar (if shorter) to one of the ways other examples of biographical fiction like ‘David Copperfield’ help readers to feel familiar and sympathetic with characters. Barbal smoothes the way for the reader to empathise with Conxa by making her narrator a familiar everywoman that readers can instantly understand. At the same time she makes this story uniquely Conxa’s by providing a picture of the Catalan community she lives in. The strong feelings Barbal associates with the often scattered relationships Conxa is involved in with her aunt, her husband Juame and her best friend also make this a personal story:
‘I had met Delina beforehand and we brought two baskets each. Would we fill them? In the smallest we were carrying the food. Bread and ham. And we would find lots of water.
We left at daybreak and at the beginning we were excited as little girls because we had finally enough time to talk to each other properly. When the going got steep though, we held our tongues to save our breath.’
Barbal’s attempt to recreate a truly natural, authentic narrative voice makes ‘Stone in a Landslide’ a confusing book to read from a feminist point of view. The men in Conxa’s life often make decisions for her and even when she is an adult her son decides where she will live. Conxa is accepting of this, as this male control is expected in her world. Her attitude often seems quite passive. The author is trying to authentically recreate a life lived many years before she is writing, so she reproduces the societal norms of the time, but she doesn’t endorse them. Does she comment on their wrongness? I’d argue that by having Conxa mention them she makes it clear that many will not consider the idea of a man in the position of domestic control default and right. Conxa also repeatedly mentions her belief that the women do the real work on the farm:
‘When I thought about the families I knew well, I saw the women as the foundation stone. If I thought about my home, it was my mother who did all the work or organized others to do it. Not to mention Tia. The woman had the children, raised them, harvested, took care of the pigsty, the chicken coop, the rabbits. She did the housework and so many other things: the vegetable garden, the jams, the sausages…What did the man do? Spent the day doing things outside. When a cow had to be sold. When someone had to be hired for the harvest. It wasn’t obvious that the man did more or was more, but everyone said, What is a farm without a man? And I thought, What is a house without a woman? But what everyone had always said weighed on me. I only knew that I wanted a boy.’ .
So, although Conxa never physically stands up to critique the idea that men should not control women’s lives she does challenge these ideas in her mind. However, this idea can feel like a bit of a stretch sometimes and if readers don’t connect with Conxa’s strong spirit they might find her physical passivity hard to justify.
In later life Conxa finds herself caught up in a terrifying situation. Juame is considered a dangerous radical by the government and he is abducted by them, as are Conxa and her children. Conxa and the children survive, but the children eventually desert the farm and Conxa moves to Barcelona with her grown up son, because ‘Even if I had dared to say, Leave me to stay here, I want to die on this land, it wouldn’t have made any difference.’ . Here the book becomes a little sad and nostalgic, although Conxa’s spirit continues. As readers only met her two hundred pages ago, happily living at the farm the charms of her present situation seem apparent and sadness may hit readers strongly.
I would maybe caution that this book is slight. I mean that’s the entire premise of the Pierine Press, but I do think you have to find an emotional connection with Conxa, otherwise you look up two hundred pages later and go ‘Huh that was over fast’. I’m actually not really sure what you’re supposed to do with that comment now I’ve made it – suck it and see I guess. Wow I am really helpful today. I know I was extremely keen on this book (as was my mum) but, as with all reading experiences, keep in mind subjectivity and personal connection play a huge part in book love.
Thanks go to Peirine for providing me with a copy of this book.
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