Two Evenings of a Holiday

Holiday

 The poem “The Evening of the Holiday,” by eighteenth-century poet Giacomo Leopardi shares more than just its inscription with Shirley Hazzard’s twentieth-century novel of the same title. Both works explore the affects of a holiday: a break from reality. They both explore the way that the feelings that develop during this time make returning to their ordinary worlds both difficult and unnatural. In both works, the best outcome seems to be bringing an aspect of the ‘holiday’ back into their respective worlds, but in neither case does this occur. In both works, it appears that it is the women who are holding back, who are letting the ‘holiday’ come to an end (in Leopardi’s poem: “I to thee all hope deny”). To these women, the only option seems to be a return to their ordinary lives, and the men are left in anguish.  Both writers seem to be reflecting in these women a damaging want of safety and comfort over glory – paralleling the loss of glory in Rome that Leopardi directly mentions in his poem.

In Hazzard’s novel, there are two main characters, Sophie and Tancredi. Sophie comes to Italy from England and it is revealed that she is half-Italian herself. Still, the language and place seem to be foreign to her. It is never crystal clear why she is there, but it is summer and seems to be a typical holiday. She becomes acquainted with Tancredi and soon after their first meeting (where there seems to be a lack of physical chemistry but at the same time a curiosity) they become romantically entangled. The novel skips and jumps but the reader is given the impression that things became very serious very quickly. Several times in the novel Hazzard mentions how Sophie somehow remains in a way “aloof.” This can be compared to the sleeping woman in Leopardi’s poem. In both works, the women and their deepest emotions are largely veiled. What is left in both works is a depiction of a man struggling with the temporariness of a good thing, and a struggle against place and time.

In both Leopardi’s poem and Hazzard’s novel, place and time are working against the main characters. This brings us to the question: can time and place be overcome? It seems possible as in both pieces of literature main characters seem to have strong yearnings to recapture or keep the feelings, yet in both cases these desires are not realized. Yet, all of the main characters appear somewhat cowardly in the end, speaking to the idea that if one is not cowardly, the complex issues posed by time and place can, in fact, be overcome.