Saturday, August 18, 2007

A perfect example to follow - Part One

As I promised last week, today I'll tell you few words about Jan Yvarsen, a very strong character that completely influenced my perception of the world.

Jan is the main character of the Marie Anne Desmarest's novel, Torrents, a long written story in which we can see Jan as a child who discovers the world, an adolescent who feels the first thrills of love and finally, a mature person who takes decisions and goes straight ahead.

At the beginning of the novel, we see Jan as an orphan from an early age, living with his aunt Brita and his cousin, Sigrid, the character that had a huge influence in Jan's destiny. The fact that Jan was an orphan had a great importance in his life's development: he learned all by himself both how to handle difficult situations and how to shape his personality.

Jan and Sigrid were raised together, they both received a solid education that made them brilliant. Every person around them was sensitive to the spell of their appearance.

His first love was (of course) Sigrid, a very beautiful lady who would do anything (even really bad things) to protect the relationship she had with Jan.

They were supposed to get married, when the fate attacked: they were separated by a minor incident (I invite you to discover the event that made them separate).

Without thinking very much, Jan leaves his native country, going to Transvaal, a wild region, where he becames a real saviour for the poor people that live there (I already told you last week that he was a brilliant doctor). Under the impulse of the moment, he marries Ide, a girl of a modest condition who absolutely worshipped him, who lived only to see his blue sight.

Although he put thousands of kilometres between him and Sigrid, he never succeeded to escape from her spell. He is cursed to dream about that stunning lady all his life.

The terrible things that Sigrid made to get Jan back to her separated them for good. Jan's superior condition didn't allow him to forget and especially to forgive her.

He marries again: this time, Therese would bring him peace and stability. Therese made him to modify his obsession for Sigrid into a secret and intimate feeling that would always remain hidden.

Jan chooses equilibrium and stability instead of passion and desire. And so did Cathy Earnshaw from Wuthering Heights (I told you few words about her two weeks ago).

In this world, both Jan and Cathy decided that reason and sensibility (not inner genuine feelings) must rule their lives. But in the world of shaddows, Cathy decided to reject reason and to accept passion.

In the world that makes all our sins fade away, in that world, what do you think Jan would choose?



1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Good words.