The Sonnet Lover by Carol Goodman

Literature professor Rose Asher is invited to La Civetta, a villa near Florence, with a sonnet and a note by her dead star student. She was there twenty years before, as an undergraduate and a love affair from that time still haunts her. When her boyfriend invites her to go with him, she refuses, however she couldn't turn down and invitation in a form of fourteen lines of iambic pentameter supposedly written by an Italian poetess, who Rose thinks is Shakespeare's Dark Lady.

Who was Shakespeare's Dark Lady? I imagine her to be an older woman, sophisticated, educated, perhaps a rich noblewoman. I see her as a femme fatale, seducing a younger man. A woman ready to move on once she'd had enough of him, triggering his jealousy and becoming his female evil, his bad angel. But that's my version, possibly fuelled by something else I read. Rose thinks Shakespeare's Dark Lady is an Italian girl and is trying to find the sonnets she wrote to Shakespeare and left them at La Civetta before she was forced to enter a monastery. 

This book is full of Italy, Florence, Shakespeare's plays and sonnets, Boccaccio's Decameron, renaissance history and legends. We read about a young talent, dying too soon, movie directors, lots of dollars and a bad guy who eventually gets caught. And Love (intentionally written with a capital L), with the spirit of "When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st", entertwining with the words of the story.

I like Carol Goodman's novels. My favourite is still Arcadia Falls. I love her writing, her ability to evoke atmosphere and longing to just go, leave, drive all the way to Florence just to inhale the smell of old stone and enjoy a glass of red wine while dusk falls. But I digress ... again. The Sonnet Lover is OK, I read it quickly, however there are some things I missed. There's a pattern on the floor, the rose petals set in pietre dure and the rest of the pattern (I'm not telling what it is, you'll just have to read the book to find out). It's just a feeling, but I think something was missing there. Why would a renaissance stone cutter do it and more importantly, even if he did, how did he manage to get away with it. This is what I wanted to know more about. The story of the stone cutter, his daughter and all the bits and pieces I missed. 

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Zadnje, kar je profesorica književnosti Rose Asher prejela od svojega umrlega študenta, je bil sonet in sporočilo, ki se bere kot povabilo v Italijo, v vilo La Civetta, blizu Firenc. V vili je že bila, dvajset let prej, kot študentka. Ljubezen iz tistega časa ji še vedno ne da miru. Ko jo tja povabi sedanji ljubimec, ga zavrne. Ne more pa zavrniti štirinajst vrstic jambskega peterca, ki naj bi jih napisala renesančna italijanska pesnica, za katero Rose domneva, da je Shakespearova Temna dama.

Kdo je sploh bila Temna dama? Predstavljam si jo kot prefinjeno, izobraženo žensko, morda bogato plemkinjo. Po mojem je podobna femme fatale, ki zapelje mlajšega moškega. Ko ga ima dovolj, ga zapusti, to pa v njem povzroči ljubosumnost, da zanj postane zlobni temni angel. Sicer pa je to moja verzija, najverjtneje podžgana s čim drugim, kar sem prebrala. Rose misli, da je Temna dama Italijanka, ki je Shakespearu napisala vrsto sonetov in naj bi jih pustila v La Civetti, preden je bila prisiljena oditi v samostan.

Knjiga je polna Italije, Firenc, Shakespearovih sonetov in dram, Boccacciovega Dekamerona, renesančne zgodovine in legend. Izvemo kaj se je zgodilo z mladim talentiranim študentom, ki je prezgodaj umrl, kakšno povezavo z vsem skupaj imajo ljudje iz filmske industrije in velike količine denarja, in kdo so slabi fantje, ki jih na koncu seveda ujamejo. Kljub vsemu se zdi, da je glavna junakinja ravno Ljubezen (namenoma pisana z veliko začetnico), kako se v duhu verza "saj v mojih pesmih raseš v večne čase"* prepleta z besedami iz zgodbe. 

Všeč so mi romani Carol Goodman. Moj najljubši še je vedno Arcadia Falls. Všeč mi je kako piše, kako zna vzbuditi atmosfero in hrepenenje po tem, da bi šla, sedla v avto in se odpeljala vse do Firenc samo zato, da bi vdihnila vonj po starih hišah in spila kozarec rdečega vina, medtem ko pada mrak. Vem, vem, spet sem zajadrala drugam. Skratka, knjiga je čisto v redu, hitro sem jo prebrala, čeprav se mi zdi, da nekaj manjka. Na tleh v vili je vzorec, del njega je sestavljen iz vrtničnih listov iz poldragih kamnov (kaj je drugi del vzorca ne povem, boste morali prebrati knjigo, da bi ugotovili). Zakaj bi renesančni kamnosek izdelal tak vzorec in kako to, da so mu dovolili? O tem bi rada izvedela, o kamnoseku, njegovi hčeri in vseh malenkostih, ki sem jih pogrešala. 

*prevod: Janez Menart