Cavafy by Lorenzo Mattotti
The New Yorker (March 16, 2009)
My next-door neighbour - the man at number 6 - came from another land, across another sea. He did so, presumably, in the expectation of finding another city - a better city - in which to make a home and raise a family.
He's ended up, however, here on Harold Hill and living in a two-up, two-down former council house; which must feel cramped when you not only have a wife and two young children, but your in-laws and a dog to accommodate.
And so, he's decided to singlehandedly rebuild the house; extend the kitchen, convert the loft, add a front porch and a new drive, etc. This has meant two years of drilling, hammering, and cement mixing; i.e., two years of noise and dust and having to look out onto what was once a pleasantly overgrown back garden but is now a building site-cum-rubbish dump: Wherever I direct my gaze, the ruins are all I see.
I suppose, if it makes him happy to spend all his free time toiling away and aspiring towards not only a bigger and better home, but a bigger and better life, that's really up to him. Personally, I have no such desire or ambition and don't hope for elsewhere. I'm tempted to tell him that no matter what improvements he makes to the house he remains the man at number 6, with the same wife, kids, and in-laws:
'Tis the same streets in which he'll walk the dog.
The same district in which he'll grow old;
and inside the same house he'll turn grey.
Ultimately, if within your own small corner you can't learn to be content, then you'll never be happy anywhere in the world ...
And so, he's decided to singlehandedly rebuild the house; extend the kitchen, convert the loft, add a front porch and a new drive, etc. This has meant two years of drilling, hammering, and cement mixing; i.e., two years of noise and dust and having to look out onto what was once a pleasantly overgrown back garden but is now a building site-cum-rubbish dump: Wherever I direct my gaze, the ruins are all I see.
I suppose, if it makes him happy to spend all his free time toiling away and aspiring towards not only a bigger and better home, but a bigger and better life, that's really up to him. Personally, I have no such desire or ambition and don't hope for elsewhere. I'm tempted to tell him that no matter what improvements he makes to the house he remains the man at number 6, with the same wife, kids, and in-laws:
'Tis the same streets in which he'll walk the dog.
The same district in which he'll grow old;
and inside the same house he'll turn grey.
Ultimately, if within your own small corner you can't learn to be content, then you'll never be happy anywhere in the world ...
See: C. P. Cavafy, 'The City', Collected Poems, trans. Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard, (Princeton University Press, 1975): click here.
Obviously, I'm riffing on this poem in this post and sampling lines from it. Readers should note, however, that I relied upon a new translation of the work by Maria Thanassa (2020) and not the one to which I link here.
