Read Online Letters from Yelena by Guy Mankowski - Free Book Online
Authors: Guy Mankowski
Ads: Link
something small. She desperately wanted to be a ballerina one day,
she knew that much. But she wanted it in such a hostile way that it didn’t seem very likely to happen.
My mother died when I was six. She was a flighty, small town girl, idealistic and naïve. She was English, and she ensured that I was raised speaking the language that she loved as well as
Russian. This meant that although I retained a slight Ukrainian accent with some English words, my dialect did not possess the usual plummeting vowels that most Ukrainian bilingual’s possess.
As you know, my Russian background was not easy to detect. If anything, I spoke with a slight County Durham accent, for that is where she was raised. As a student, my mother studied English
literature, and one of her first legacies to me was to pass on her love of this language. I collected and treasured English words as another child might collect stamps, and I delighted in writing
and speaking the language at every opportunity. Whereas I found Russian to be a restricted and proud tongue, I found English delightfully exact. I seemed able to express myself better with it.
English represented my mother, it was artistic and expressive. Russian represented my father; purposeful and determined. This was perhaps the reason I wrote my diary, from the age of eleven, in
clipped and vibrant English.
My mother met my father at university, and moved with him to his homeland in Ukraine to start a family. I don’t think she had expected to stay there as long as she did, but his business
began to flourish and she found herself drawn into nursing his mother through her final years. She was dutiful and protective of his mother, just as at times she could be over-protective of me. I
think she felt I was not tough enough for the world, and she wanted to hold me back from it slightly. Tragically, she did not outlive her mother-in-law by very long. She was hit by a bus while out
shopping with a friend. I remember the hysteria in her friend’s eyes when she came to tell my father what had happened. My father had been utterly devoted to her, and her death caused a
rupture inside him, which he never recovered from. He lost the will to fight after that, perhaps he felt there was nothing really to fight for now. I remember the utter confusion I felt about what
had happened to her; it seemed no-one could give me a proper answer. Her sudden disappearance left a void in my life, which was never fully addressed. I think perhaps that my love of England became
an expression of my frustrated love for her.
My mother’s second legacy to me was ballet. She started dancing late, and I often wonder if she encouraged me to begin early so that I would have it all my life. When I was five she took
me along to the local folk group, which danced at the village hall. I think they hoped she would become more involved, but her focus was only on nurturing me. She saw that I had a talent before
anyone else did. I think she wanted me to have the glamorous, and in her eyes artistic life she never had, and I have always strived to fulfil that wish of hers. I can only imagine how she would
have felt if she’d have known that one day her daughter would dance the part of Giselle.
It seems hard now to imagine how she would feel about anything. She has retreated into time, become idealised. She no longer feels like flesh and bone, but like a half-forgotten dream, one that
I feel perpetually guilty for not fully remembering.
The only video we still have captures her as gamine and fragile. A sunny, natural happiness shines from her face, which does not seem strong enough to deal with it. I look most like the
mysterious woman on that video when I am upset or ecstatic. In it she is standing in the living room of her and my father’s first home, and my sister and I are still dots on the horizon. My
father is picking out the notes of a slow waltz on the piano and she is dancing lightly along to it. Even to my
she knew that much. But she wanted it in such a hostile way that it didn’t seem very likely to happen.
My mother died when I was six. She was a flighty, small town girl, idealistic and naïve. She was English, and she ensured that I was raised speaking the language that she loved as well as
Russian. This meant that although I retained a slight Ukrainian accent with some English words, my dialect did not possess the usual plummeting vowels that most Ukrainian bilingual’s possess.
As you know, my Russian background was not easy to detect. If anything, I spoke with a slight County Durham accent, for that is where she was raised. As a student, my mother studied English
literature, and one of her first legacies to me was to pass on her love of this language. I collected and treasured English words as another child might collect stamps, and I delighted in writing
and speaking the language at every opportunity. Whereas I found Russian to be a restricted and proud tongue, I found English delightfully exact. I seemed able to express myself better with it.
English represented my mother, it was artistic and expressive. Russian represented my father; purposeful and determined. This was perhaps the reason I wrote my diary, from the age of eleven, in
clipped and vibrant English.
My mother met my father at university, and moved with him to his homeland in Ukraine to start a family. I don’t think she had expected to stay there as long as she did, but his business
began to flourish and she found herself drawn into nursing his mother through her final years. She was dutiful and protective of his mother, just as at times she could be over-protective of me. I
think she felt I was not tough enough for the world, and she wanted to hold me back from it slightly. Tragically, she did not outlive her mother-in-law by very long. She was hit by a bus while out
shopping with a friend. I remember the hysteria in her friend’s eyes when she came to tell my father what had happened. My father had been utterly devoted to her, and her death caused a
rupture inside him, which he never recovered from. He lost the will to fight after that, perhaps he felt there was nothing really to fight for now. I remember the utter confusion I felt about what
had happened to her; it seemed no-one could give me a proper answer. Her sudden disappearance left a void in my life, which was never fully addressed. I think perhaps that my love of England became
an expression of my frustrated love for her.
My mother’s second legacy to me was ballet. She started dancing late, and I often wonder if she encouraged me to begin early so that I would have it all my life. When I was five she took
me along to the local folk group, which danced at the village hall. I think they hoped she would become more involved, but her focus was only on nurturing me. She saw that I had a talent before
anyone else did. I think she wanted me to have the glamorous, and in her eyes artistic life she never had, and I have always strived to fulfil that wish of hers. I can only imagine how she would
have felt if she’d have known that one day her daughter would dance the part of Giselle.
It seems hard now to imagine how she would feel about anything. She has retreated into time, become idealised. She no longer feels like flesh and bone, but like a half-forgotten dream, one that
I feel perpetually guilty for not fully remembering.
The only video we still have captures her as gamine and fragile. A sunny, natural happiness shines from her face, which does not seem strong enough to deal with it. I look most like the
mysterious woman on that video when I am upset or ecstatic. In it she is standing in the living room of her and my father’s first home, and my sister and I are still dots on the horizon. My
father is picking out the notes of a slow waltz on the piano and she is dancing lightly along to it. Even to my
Similar Books
