The Fall

by Diogo Mainardi

The underground garages of Avenida Vieira Souto reconciled me to Brazil.

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  In the previous image: Tito in a garage with his walker.

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  Giacomo Leopardi was deformed.

  He was four feet seven inches tall. Two large humps — caused by bone tuberculosis — made him a hunchback.

  He was asthmatic and almost blind.

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  In one of his letters, Giacomo Leopardi said that his appearance was “wretched” and “utterly despicable.” He also said that he had “only half of what other men had.” He considered himself to be a “walking sepulchre” and expected death to come at any moment.

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  Just as I always wanted to leave Brazil, Giacomo Leopardi always wanted to leave Recanati, where he was born.

  Recanati, according to him, was a “savage village,” inhabited by “vile, vulgar people.” He dreamed constantly of leaving “that filthy town, where the men were either asses or rogues — or both.”

  Giacomo Leopardi dreamed of leaving Recanati and never going back.

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  In 1822, Giacomo Leopardi finally found a way of leaving Recanati. He spent some time in Rome, staying in the house of an uncle. Contrary to the idealized picture of the city he had built up from reading the Latin poets, Rome seemed to him squalid and provincial, corrupt and full of prostitutes.

  Giacomo Leopardi returned to Recanati six months later.

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  When he returned to Recanati, Giacomo Leopardi devoted himself to a life that was “entirely and solely interior.” The fruit of that entirely and solely interior life were his Operette morali (Small Moral Works).

  When I returned to Brazil, I too devoted myself to a life that was entirely and solely interior. My Operette morali were the underground garages in Avenida Vieira Souto. Tito and I would spend the day there, exploring their interior.

  In his speculative garage, Giacomo Leopardi conversed with Torquato Tasso and with the Moon. Tito and I conversed with the porters of the buildings of Ipanema and with Toyota SUVs.

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  In Recanati, between 14 and 19 May 1824, Giacomo Leopardi wrote his “Dialogue between a Natural Philosopher and a Metaphysician,” the tenth essay in his Operette morali.

  The Natural Philosopher, inspired by the medical quackery of Tommaso Rangone, the author of How Man Can Live for More than 120 Years, reveals that he has discovered — “Eureka! Eureka!” — how to become immortal.

  The Metaphysician replies that he is only interested in “the art of living little, because if life is unhappy — and it always is — the shorter the better.”

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  Giacomo Leopardi’s life was short.

  He died when he was thirty-eight, after eating, in one night, a kilo and a half of cinnamon sweets from Sulmona.

  To go back to Tommaso Rangone: the food that proved to be most harmful to Giacomo Leopardi’s health were those cannellino di Sulmona.

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  (Picture Credit 1.14)

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  In the previous image: Giacomo Leopardi dead.

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  For Giacomo Leopardi, unhappiness was man’s natural state.

  In “Dialogue Between a Natural Philosopher and a Metaphysician,” he argues that “life and unhappiness can never be separated.”

  In “Dialogue Between Torquato Tasso and his Spirit,” the Spirit sums up Giacomo Leopardi’s Theory of Pleasure, explaining to Torquato Tasso that, since “the desire for pleasure is infinite, no real pleasure — which is, inevitably, finite — can ever satisfy that desire.”

  In “Dialogue Between Malambruno and Farfarello,” Malambruno expresses the desire “to be happy at least for a moment.” When the diabolical Farfarello tells him that this is impossible, Malambruno concludes that the only happiness available to man is death, because only someone who ceases to exist ceases to be unhappy.

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  Giacomo Leopardi, who was known in Recanati as “the hunchback of Montemorello,” used disability and deformity as a metaphor for his “cosmic pessimism.”

  He wrote:

  What is life? The journey of a sick and crippled man who carries the heaviest of burdens on his back and walks day and night, never resting, up and down steep mountains, through snow and ice, through rain and wind, and in the burning sun, until he reaches the edge of a precipice or a ditch and falls inevitably into it.

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  What was my life like in Rio de Janeiro?

  It was the journey of a boy with cerebral palsy, who, with his walker, went up the ramps of the underground garages in Avenida Vieira Souto, which reeked of petrol and exhaust fumes, until he reached the edge of a step and managed to stop before he fell.

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  Happiness is Tito’s natural state.

  He infected me with his cosmic optimism. Devoting myself “entirely and solely” to him, I too was happy.

  I had ceased to exist.

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  In the previous image: the little man with the egg-shaped face is happy — cosmically happy.

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  According to Giacomo Leopardi, happiness is always to be found in the past or the future — never in the present.

  I was cosmically happy in 2004.

  If I had to choose a moment in my past when I was even happier, however, I would choose the next year — 2005.

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  Nico was born on 16 June 2005.

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  Nico’s birth, in Rio de Janeiro, was the opposite of Tito’s birth.

  He was spared Dottoressa F. He was spared the amniotomy. He was spared cerebral palsy.

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  After experiencing a birth that was the opposite of Tito’s, Nico became the opposite of Tito.

  If one is behind, the other is ahead. If one is bent, the other is upright. If one falls, the other is always standing. If one is the comedian, the other is the straight man. If one is Lou Costello, the other is Bud Abbott.

  Like Lou Costello, Tito is a baaaaad boy.

  Nico is the opposite.

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  In the previous image: Tito meets Nico in the maternity ward.

  It was the best act in our domestic vaudeville.

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  Karel Bobath and Berta Busse recommended that, during therapy, the child with cerebral palsy should look at himself in a mirror.

  Nico was Tito’s mirror. Tito was Nico’s mirror. Nico could see his mirror image in Tito. Tito could see his mirror image in Nico.

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  Tito’s cerebral-palsy world was Lewis Carroll’s looking-glass world: time went backward, inanimate objects came alive, the laws of Nature were subverted.

  In Tito’s cerebral-palsy world, Nico played the part of Alice.

  He was a “sensible” boy. He was exactly the same as other people — “two eyes … nose in the middle, mouth under.”

  Tito was exactly the opposite of other people.

  He was the little man with the egg-shaped face from the communicator. He was Humpty Dumpty sitting on the wall. He was Humpty Dumpty losing his balance and falling off the wall.

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  Until Nico was born, Tito was practically mute.

  His dyspraxia meant that he couldn’t coordinate the movements of his vocal apparatus.

  After Nico was born, he never stopped talking.

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  Tito’s first words, like those of Humpty Dumpty, had “a temper, some of them — particularly verbs.”

  If Humpty Dumpty mastered the language of “Jabberwocky,” the poem written in mirror-writing, Tito’s language was Jabberwocky itself.

  He reversed the order of the letters in a word. He reversed the order of the words in a sentence. He reversed the order of the sentences in a paragraph.

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  Over time, Tito’s Jabberwocky became less impenetrable.

  I could understand him. My wife could understand him. Nico co
uld understand him.

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  In the latter part of 2005, Tito abandoned his communicator.

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  In the previous image: Nico examines President Lula.

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  For Christmas 2005, Veja asked me to write a column looking back over the year.

  This was illustrated by Nico’s photo, at six months old, examining Lula.

  The caption:

  In June, my younger son was born.

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  A passage from the article:

  I spent all year poking fun at Lula. I devoted more than thirty articles to him. I promised to bring him down in 2005. I failed. Now I promise to bring him down in 2006. People said that my campaign against the President of the Republic was ideologically motivated. Not at all. I was only doing it for sport.

  Some people fish. Some people hunt. I just try to bring down Lula. He is my paca. He is my tapir.

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  Giacomo Leopardi described his own times as “stupid” and “dull.”

  My work as a journalist consisted in repeating week after week that my own times were stupid and dull.

  Giacomo Leopardi called the inhabitants of his own town “asses” and “rogues.”

  My work as a journalist consisted in repeating week after week that the inhabitants of my own country were asses and rogues.

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  In the early years, I was able to reconcile my work as a journalist with my work as a father.

  That changed after 2005.

  I gradually lost interest in the asses and rogues of my country. All that remained was my interest in my home life.

  The photo of Nico examining the President of the Republic was a way of declaring the supremacy of private life over public life.

  Fatherhood became my ideology.

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  In the previous image: Tito picks Lula up by the ears.

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  In the same review of the year in which I published the photo of Nico examining Lula, I also published the photo of Tito picking Lula up by the ears.

  The caption:

  In September, my elder son managed to take sixteen steps.

  If the most important event of 2005 was Nico’s birth, then Tito’s sixteen steps were the second most important event of the year.

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  I published a photo of Tito at Christmas 2005. David Cameron published a photo of Ivan at Christmas 2008.

  Ivan was David Cameron’s eldest child. Like Tito, he had cerebral palsy.

  The decision to publish Ivan’s photo became one of the big talking points of the electoral campaign in the UK. David Cameron was accused of exploiting his son’s cerebral palsy.

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  David Cameron stopped being accused of making political capital out of Ivan’s cerebral palsy only when Ivan died.

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  I exploited Tito’s cerebral palsy and I continue to exploit it.

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  The reason I started exploiting Tito’s cerebral palsy was the subject of one of my columns:

  Montaigne was a devoted father. In one of his most famous essays, he wrote about paternal love and flaunted his daughter Léonor. Montaigne flaunted his daughter Léonor just as I flaunted my son Tito and Tom Cruise flaunted his daughter Suri. Léonor was the Suri of the Renaissance. In another of his most famous essays, Montaigne argued that to philosophize is to learn to die. I learned how to die with fatherhood.

  From the day Tito was born, I was completely cancelled out by him. I lost my will. I ceased to exist. Only a dead person can cease to exist. If philosophizing is learning to die, then fatherhood is the philosophy of the ordinary man, the philosophy of the poor in spirit, the philosophy of the masses.

  It is the only philosophy within the grasp of people like Tom Cruise and me.

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  In 1635, Rumbertus was born, the first child of Rembrandt and his wife, Saskia. When he was less than two months old, he died.

  In 1638, two and half years after Rumbertus’s death, Rembrandt and Saskia had a daughter. Her name was Cornelia. She died before she was two weeks old.

  In 1640, after the deaths of Rumbertus and Cornelia, Rembrandt and Saskia had another daughter. Like their previous daughter, her name was Cornelia. And like the previous Cornelia, she died prematurely, at two months.

  In 1641, after the deaths of Rumbertus, the first Cornelia and the second Cornelia, Rembrandt and Saskia had another son. On their fourth and final attempt, it worked. The child survived.

  The name of the surviving son: yes, Titus.

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  Rembrandt exploited his son Titus in the same way I exploited my son Tito.

  He painted him reading. He painted him writing. He painted him holding a magnifying glass. He painted him with a sword and wearing armor.

  When Titus was fourteen, Rembrandt painted him wearing a black beret and a pearl earring. When Titus was seventeen, Rembrandt painted him wearing a red beret and a gold chain. When Titus was nineteen, Rembrandt painted him wearing a black beret and a moustache. When Titus was twenty-two, Rembrandt painted him wearing a black beret and a fur coat.

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  (Picture Credit 1.15)

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  In the previous image: Rembrandt’s son Titus in Monk’s Habit.

  The painting is by Rembrandt van Rijn. It dates from 1660.

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  Titus was Rembrandt’s principal model.

  Only Rembrandt himself posed for more paintings, with his seventy self-portraits — always looking through a looking glass, his image reversed.

  As well as posing for portraits, Titus also posed, from his birth onward, for other paintings by his father, especially those that drew their inspiration from biblical passages. Rembrandt depicted him as Joseph, as Daniel and as the young Tobias.

  In The Evangelist Matthew and the Angel, Titus is the angel whispering into the saint’s ear. In Christ Seated Disputing with the Doctors, Titus is Jesus Christ. In Christ Returning from the Temple with His Parents, Titus is Jesus Christ. In The Twelve-year-old Jesus in Front of the Scribes, Titus is, again, Jesus Christ.

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  For Rembrandt, Titus was Everything.

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  If, as John Ruskin argued, the history of art can be divided into those who worship God and those who worship Man, then Rembrandt is the hero of those, like me, who only worship Tito/Titus.

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  John Ruskin wrote:

  It is the aim of the best painters to paint the noblest things they can see by sunlight. It was the aim of Rembrandt to paint the foulest things he could see — by rushlight.

  According to John Ruskin, what marked Rembrandt out was the vividness of his darkness and the inexpressiveness of his light. The colors in his paintings were murky and fetid. Instead of illuminating beauty, he cloaked ugliness in shadows.

  When Rembrandt painted the Virgin Mary ascending into heaven, he saw “only the lamplight upon the hair of a costermonger’s ass.” When he painted “an unsightly firework of unsightlier angels,” he showed “the feet instead of the head, and the shame instead of the honour.” When he made an etching of the parable of the Good Samaritan, “we may see only in distance the back of the good Samaritan, and in nearness the back of the good Samaritan’s dog,” and the dog is defecating.

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  Tito was my Rembrandt.

  His cerebral palsy obscured everything I had always worshipped. In particular, literature. What it illuminated — what became my sole focus — were the most ordinary, most domestic, most familiar aspects of life.

  In that moment, I saw only Tito’s deformed feet taking those sixteen steps. And in the foreground, I saw Nico defecating.

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  Rembrandt’s finest work, according to John Ruskin, was his self-portrait as the Prodigal Son in the tavern, in which he is dressed as a gentleman, with his wife, Saskia, sitting on his knee.

  Rembrandt is looking at us through the
mirror, irreverently flaunting his private life and raising a glass of wine in a toast to domestic bliss.

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  (Picture Credit 1.16)

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  In the previous image: The Prodigal Son in the Tavern, also known as Portrait of the Artist with his Wife Saskia, by Rembrandt van Rijn.

  The painting dates from 1635.

  Rembrandt is the Prodigal Son. Saskia is the prostitute.

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  John Ruskin noted that in The Prodigal Son in the Tavern, Rembrandt could have portrayed the nobility of love and married life, because he was one of the greatest painters of all time.

  But what did he do?

  He again painted “the foulest thing by rushlight,” illuminating “only corners and points of things, and those very corners and points ill and distortedly.”

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  Man, for Rembrandt, is always imperfect and distorted — a falling body.

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  Like Rembrandt, I too was flaunting my private life and drinking a toast to domestic bliss.

  My domestic bliss was represented by an imperfect, distorted boy, who, at that moment, was capable of taking sixteen steps without falling.