The Scientists: A Family Romance, by Marco Roth is an unusual memoir, and one, in my opinion that is written more to find psychological and familial truth through the act of writing, than to portray one’s life.
During the 1980s through 1990s fear of AIDS was rampant throughout the country. This fear and is the foundation upon which his teenage years was built. Roth learns at the age of fourteen that his father, Eugene, has AIDS, and is told he acquired it from a needle that slipped out of a patient’s arm. Roth was told never to tell anyone of his father’s condition. Secrecy was the basics of his upbringing. He carried that burden for years to come.
The Scientists is a metaphor for the life of denial that Roth’s parents lived, harboring the secrets that caused Eugene’s (his father’s) AIDS, and eventual death, and harboring other secrets. This superficial exterior was fostered even after the death of Roth’s father.
Roth began to question the stories he had heard over the years, and when his aunt, Anne Rolphe’s memoir was published, he began a journey of searching for answers. His search took him through memory’s closets, and through moments too painful for his parents to acknowledge or want to remember. The time period cast a deep stain on AIDS, which caused the individuals concerned to be frowned upon. They often became societal outcasts, even within their own family members.
That, in itself, is a sad state of affairs on the human condition, and on humanity’s lack of understanding, over AIDS, homosexuality and the discrimination that lies behind ignorance and the lack of acceptance of others.
Roth’s parents were affluent, and believed that education was the answer to the future. This played heavily in his life, as he became a precocious child, playing the violin, reading Shakespeare, etc. These educational and cultural efforts were part and parcel of the Roth lifestyle.
Through his memoir he was able to move forward, and come to terms with the secrets and familial dynamics that encompassed his life. He was able to understand the social stigmas forced on those who had AIDS, the discrimination spewed out to homosexuals, and the entire spectrum surrounding those issues that led to generations of secrets. What he was not totally able to come to terms with was the total effect of how he was affected by his father’s insistence, and how the ghost of his father still lingers.
Emotions range the gamut within the pages, with Roth often wandering in limbo, trying to find the answers, answers of identity and truth. He questions himself, who he is, and whether he carries the genes of his father’s philandering.
I can not say that I enjoyed reading The Scientists: A Family Romance, it isn’t that type of memoir. I did not see the romance between the lines, other than his father’s wanderings with others. It wasn’t a book of inspiration. But, I will say that the writing is definitely illuminated with vivid imagery. Marco Roth writes with honesty and conciseness in exhibiting his emotions and thoughts, his search for truth and identity. He does not hide what was unspoken, or carry the secrets forward. That is the strength the reader finds within the pages of The Scientists: A Family Romance.
A Tranquil Star by Primo Levi
A Tranquil Star – Unpublished Stories, by Primo Levi is quite the collection of seventeen short stories within a 164 page count. Levi is well-known for his Holocaust memoirs, but in this book of short stories, he goes beyond the Holocaust, into the world of the his deep imagination, bringing us parables of the metaphysical order.
Levi has written in not so subtle words the reality of our world. We might initially not understand this collection of often horrid, bizarre and violent stories, but if we stop to think about what we are reading, it becomes clear that Levi is giving us issues to ponder. In the realm and reality of things, our world is filled with casual murders, robberies, bombings, people who look at death as entertainment, people with lack of esteem, individuals with huge egos unable to cope in a new land, and the acts and repercussions of war. Levi clearly, and with insight, has written about the humanity of our world, or, appropriately, the lack of humanity in some cases. The positives and negatives are entwined, in The Tranquil Star, to point of negativity often overcoming the positive.
If you take away nothing else from The Tranquil Star, you will see the inhumanity of individuals, the uncaring attitudes and unwillingness to bend towards being humane individuals. Levi’s insight is intense, his word images often much too descriptive (in the sense of his bringing horror to our minds), and his prose strong and vivid. Don’t get me wrong, there is lightness and humor in some of the stories, but the majority are a commentary on the universal flow. He wraps up the world, within short stories (some only six pages long), in a concise and descriptive manner, filling our eyes and minds with overwhelming visuals. The stories are a strong assessment of the fragility of our lives and world. Levi infuses the preciousness of humanity within the pages, even when the negative is strong. In my opinion that is Levi’s message…life is precious and fragile. Primo Levi was a masterful story teller, blending fantasy into the reality of our world, as we know it. The Tranquil Star is evidence of that.
~~BookDiva
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