Christian Lanciai

---

the Dilemma

Written 2008-07-03


Just an explanation. I am not the victim of my workoholism. I am merely the prisoner of my poverty. The fact that all my life's efforts as writer and composer have met with no success, no acclaim, no acknowledgement at all, has just obliged me to work the harder, since without more than a minimum income I can't allow myself any proper freedom, which I therefore struggle the more to obtain. I can't do anything more than what I am doing: trying to improve my recordings, eventually turning them into CDs, and at the moment I have two manuscripts waiting for their doom in Stockholm by insensitive bureaucratic readers for publishers and theatres whose only task is to scrap as many manuscripts as possible: in Sweden you don't have the English system of book agents. My other voluntary works for others are like a relief from this squirrel's wheel of poverty. Even when I travel I constantly have to keep myself on the shortest possible leash and allow myself no extravagances but always think of containing the wallet. So I am not really the self-made victim of workoholism, only constantly struggling to get out of my prison of poverty without losing the only freedom I have, the one of my creative work. This is my constant headache.

love,

Christian

Save as a bookmark (requires login)
Write a comment (requires login)
Send as email
Print text

from a letter to a friend

Written 2008-05-11

I have struggled with the problem all my life. Most people who encounter it just let it be and don't bother about it, trying to ignore and repress it. In my case (as maybe in yours) it was instead accentuated by my life as a musician - it became more acute, as you became more exposed and vulnerable.

An effort to define the problem: you can't reach to other people, because they don't share your awareness and your ideals, because they can't see them. Therefore you find yourself alone, dreaming about those ideal possibilities you can't have realized, like, in your case, a flowing social life of some natural intensity and spirituality. You feel isolated with your idealism, and the risk is to become lonely, especially here in Sweden.

My only way of solving the problem was to accept the situation, accept the fact that almost everyone around you was ignorant and could not share your ideals or understand them, to instead build that ideal world within your own space and universe, that is, escape into creation. I think it's actually the only way to make the insufferable problem bearable - to make the best of a bad bargain, and to love in spite of all. To go on "arrabbiarsi" about it, get embittered about it and indulge in the frustration will only make it worse and is no way out. At best, you'll find temporary relief but no solution. And wherever you are, wherever you live, you will encounter the same problem, in different forms, just because of your own uniqueness in your idealism.

Creativity is the best therapy for any artist out of any problem and dilemma, and I am afraid that's the only one.

Save as a bookmark (requires login)
Write a comment (requires login)
Send as email
Print text


Can it get worse? It always does.

Depression

Written 2008-01-15



The weather is destroyed.
The world is destroyed.
Africa is overwhelmed with Aids cemeteries
replacing civilization.
Antarctica is melting
and will drown the world.
All animals are getting extinct,
all because of man,
and we humans are the guilty ones.
The mess seems complete
and can't get any worse,
but it always does.
So what the hell can we do about it?
Nothing, but make the best of it
in at least trying to survive.

Save as a bookmark (requires login)
Write a comment (requires login)
Send as email
Print text


The lover, declining an invitation:
"Sorry, but I dare not risk again to find other lovers in your home or that they come visiting while I am with you."

The Betrayal of Beauty

Written 2007-10-23



I am afraid this argument will be considerable,
circumstantial, comprehensive, difficult and hard
for this dark lady of the sonnets
who used men for selfish means
and used her beauty ruthlessly
to without judgement treat them
as the servants of her whims,
as slaves, in fact, for her fanatic feminism.
The problem was that she was beautiful enough
to make them flock around her,
lose their senses for her beauty
and allow themselves to even be deceived by her
as she replaced each lover with another,
calling them all, naturally, only "friends".
The fact is that they all loved her
while she loved no one but herself,
a victim and a slave to her own charm and beauty,
failing to observe that there was anyone but her
in that small world of hers.
When finally she was looked through
by those she had been using for no ends except her own,
who never had been thanked for all their services
and found her finally to be without a trace of honesty,
she had deceived them all with yet another lover
while they slaved for her for months,
which was not found out until after four months
by another ex of hers, quite accidentally, of course;
and only then she had to tell them why
she had been lost to all her friends
for such a long time without answering communications.
She is now notorious, and there is nothing I can do about it.
I did everything I could for her
and find myself now free of all responsibility.
It's difficult to be a woman
and as difficult to be a man
when you can not stop loving her
no matter how much she herself betrays her beauty
while you stay on stuck with her
because you only see the beauty of the soul,
to which you can but stay forever faithful.



Save as a bookmark (requires login)
Write a comment (requires login)
Send as email
Print text


Some documentary, 3rd July at 4 in the morning, pouring rains...

Our Case

Written 2007-07-03



Sorry to be critical,
but being realistic can not harm us
but might rather help us. None of us is quite content,
and there are many reasons why.
You did receive my love from the beginning
but did never answer it,
since all you did last summer was to cry for Benny.
Your relationship with him,
that you just couldn't leave him
although he just caused you pain and suffering by his alcoholism
was the first thing separating me from you.
The second thing was your affair with Sean,
which almost killed me, since I had loved you so much
and you gave what you had to him, - for nothing,
for a painful persecution by his phoney pregnant lady.
How could I then after such a blow and undeserved experience
even risk to trust you any more? I just resigned,
accepting to be no more than your friend.
The Bernard incident was yet another set-back,
you allowed him what was never granted me,
and I had to content myself with being just locked out
from your intimacy and privacy, while he
was taking liberties and even at the hospital
by our dying patient's bed, and almost boasted of it.
I had nothing personal against him, he did admirable things
by helping you in dreadful difficulties,
which I actually was grateful for,
since I, as always, was intimidated by my poverty.
He over-stepped it, so it is a finished chapter,
while you still are occupied with grief for Benny.
Yes, I have my faults and foibles also,
being too much burdened by responsibilities that I can not let go,
too busy with sustaining the eternal battle against poverty, adversity and age,
so that I never can spend so much time with you as I would want to,
that is maybe our fate, that neither of us can let go of our past and destiny,
but still I can't deny that you are part of me and of my life,
and that I can not do without you, least of all in my thoughts,
my mind, my soul, my heart, my everything except my body.
That alone has no demand of you.

Thus have I tried here to define and pinpoint
the complexity of our relationship.
If I have failed and done you some injustice,
I apologize and humbly ask your pardon and excuse,
but I have tried at least to be completely honest with myself
and made a truthful effort of explaining how I love you
out of the deep agony of constant sleeplessness
and worries for your life and situation.


Save as a bookmark (requires login)
Write a comment (requires login)
Send as email
Print text