Loved the story, both heart-warming and heart-rendering at times. The story reveals how children have the capacity to accept and deal with trauma, sometimes better than us adults.
If the Bible is equivalent to God's Internet browser history, then the recurrent eye-gouging and associated ocular injuries are the hallmarks of a disturbing fetish; a warning, buried in the scriptures, that one should never their offer their eye up to God, even while idly entertaining the notion of cementing an unusual family tradition of 50% sight loss across the generations. My advice, for what it's worth: Keep a mumbled prayer on your lips, and your gaze respectfully lowered, as you file through the Heavenly throne room.
During the 90s, the comic writer, Grant Morrison, wrote an ongoing series titled 'The Invisibles', where language has a viral quality and can manifest in physical forms. In it, an author insert called King Mob is convinced by his torturers that he has contracted necrotizing fasciitis bacteria, that has caused his face to partially rot away, and that he has also suffered a collapsed lung as a result of his mistreatment. Shortly after writing these scenes, Morrison contracted a staphylococcus aureus infection that manifested as facial abscesses. He also suffered a bout of pneumonia resulting in a collapsed lung. He regards this overlap between fact and fiction as an example of sympathetic magic. Who knows what was really going on: Bare-bones coincidence, a corruption of the placebo effect, or something more structured that lies beyond the reach of our current understanding.
Though the means are present within Ludovica's story to work out her age, I am attempting to be more of gentleman. Consequently, I will refrain from throwing out a number. Suffice to say, there is something appealing about a person with lived experience reflecting matter-of-factly upon their past, while still able to conjure irrational childhood fears, and those peculiar impulses of youth that seem out of kilter with an adult world that is crowded with factual absurdities, among them an allergy to wood. I like the incidental detail in the story – the drip-feed of honey candy, provided by the nun-like nurse of Professor Valerio as a form of supplementary care; the grandmother methodically breaking the necks of chickens. (I once visited Ho Choi Minh City in Vietnam, which was modernising before my eyes – a block the size of the Square Mile in London, levelled and cordoned-off by wooden hoardings to make way for who knows what. I happened to glance up an alleyway as I passed by, where a man, sitting with his back to the wall and his legs stretched out before him, removed chickens one by one from a giant cage, twisted their necks and added them to an enormous mound of dead birds.)
Origami is regarded as an ancient practice and that it true up to a point. It is also true that 99% of the development in the art form has occurred over the past few decades as people from scientific backgrounds have become interested in a technique that amounts to the controlled collapsing of sheets of paper. Akira Yoshisawa, who is regarded as the father of modern origami, was an engineer, who, during the war, used his models to raise the spirits of hospital patients. My bedroom ceiling is covered in origami – mostly birds and fish – that I have folded using the patterns of the many talented designers working in the field (there is some really good stuff coming out of Vietnam at the moment). It was once my great pleasure to discover that a spider had made a web inside the body cavity of a paper shark, imbuing this still life with a functioning digestive system and awakening its implied predatory nature.
'A Brief History of my Glass Eye' has the same dimensions as one of those fables where the great and the good of a fictional kingdom line-up to offer suggestions that will resolve some intractable problem. I concluded reading it with a deep affection for Ludovica Barassi, and a realisation that those children who are troublesome in peculiar or vexing ways, are often engaged in a heartfelt struggle to align their moral compass with the expectations of an indifferent or amoral world.
A engrossing story of a long running childhood illness. Its spunky heroine, her lovely family and docs, and her somehow delightfully gruesome misadventures are all beautifully captured in this brief memoir.
What a wonderful story, and funny too. I couldn't believe I was laughing at certain bits. But interesting that the author didn't take the route of a "miracle" type situation. And having 2 members of the family with a glass eye is freaky. Turning the disability into something electronic is sheer genius. No one else can do what they can. Wonderful. Thank you.
What a moving piece of writing! Something similar has happened to a friend recently. Our eyes are very sensitive and it's unbelievable how helpless doctors still are if one has an eye condition.
This is an extraordinary story of the resilience, strength and courage that only the innocence of a child could possess.To endure and overcome the unimaginable and with such humour ,love and lighthearted belief in one’s destiny is truly humbling.I salute Ludo - Bravo!
I started reading this and couldn’t stop. The young protagonist is full of life despite the terrible pain and treatments she describes. I especially enjoyed the end when her father showed her how to make their eyes flash in a cinema, reversing a primarily serious situation into a fun one.
Wonderful story. The matter-of-fact quality makes it particularly appealing and heartening.
Wow!!! What a formidable child what a stunningly well -written piece. Wondrous human.
Loved the story, both heart-warming and heart-rendering at times. The story reveals how children have the capacity to accept and deal with trauma, sometimes better than us adults.
If the Bible is equivalent to God's Internet browser history, then the recurrent eye-gouging and associated ocular injuries are the hallmarks of a disturbing fetish; a warning, buried in the scriptures, that one should never their offer their eye up to God, even while idly entertaining the notion of cementing an unusual family tradition of 50% sight loss across the generations. My advice, for what it's worth: Keep a mumbled prayer on your lips, and your gaze respectfully lowered, as you file through the Heavenly throne room.
During the 90s, the comic writer, Grant Morrison, wrote an ongoing series titled 'The Invisibles', where language has a viral quality and can manifest in physical forms. In it, an author insert called King Mob is convinced by his torturers that he has contracted necrotizing fasciitis bacteria, that has caused his face to partially rot away, and that he has also suffered a collapsed lung as a result of his mistreatment. Shortly after writing these scenes, Morrison contracted a staphylococcus aureus infection that manifested as facial abscesses. He also suffered a bout of pneumonia resulting in a collapsed lung. He regards this overlap between fact and fiction as an example of sympathetic magic. Who knows what was really going on: Bare-bones coincidence, a corruption of the placebo effect, or something more structured that lies beyond the reach of our current understanding.
Though the means are present within Ludovica's story to work out her age, I am attempting to be more of gentleman. Consequently, I will refrain from throwing out a number. Suffice to say, there is something appealing about a person with lived experience reflecting matter-of-factly upon their past, while still able to conjure irrational childhood fears, and those peculiar impulses of youth that seem out of kilter with an adult world that is crowded with factual absurdities, among them an allergy to wood. I like the incidental detail in the story – the drip-feed of honey candy, provided by the nun-like nurse of Professor Valerio as a form of supplementary care; the grandmother methodically breaking the necks of chickens. (I once visited Ho Choi Minh City in Vietnam, which was modernising before my eyes – a block the size of the Square Mile in London, levelled and cordoned-off by wooden hoardings to make way for who knows what. I happened to glance up an alleyway as I passed by, where a man, sitting with his back to the wall and his legs stretched out before him, removed chickens one by one from a giant cage, twisted their necks and added them to an enormous mound of dead birds.)
Origami is regarded as an ancient practice and that it true up to a point. It is also true that 99% of the development in the art form has occurred over the past few decades as people from scientific backgrounds have become interested in a technique that amounts to the controlled collapsing of sheets of paper. Akira Yoshisawa, who is regarded as the father of modern origami, was an engineer, who, during the war, used his models to raise the spirits of hospital patients. My bedroom ceiling is covered in origami – mostly birds and fish – that I have folded using the patterns of the many talented designers working in the field (there is some really good stuff coming out of Vietnam at the moment). It was once my great pleasure to discover that a spider had made a web inside the body cavity of a paper shark, imbuing this still life with a functioning digestive system and awakening its implied predatory nature.
'A Brief History of my Glass Eye' has the same dimensions as one of those fables where the great and the good of a fictional kingdom line-up to offer suggestions that will resolve some intractable problem. I concluded reading it with a deep affection for Ludovica Barassi, and a realisation that those children who are troublesome in peculiar or vexing ways, are often engaged in a heartfelt struggle to align their moral compass with the expectations of an indifferent or amoral world.
Wonderful! Thank you, beautifully written XX
A engrossing story of a long running childhood illness. Its spunky heroine, her lovely family and docs, and her somehow delightfully gruesome misadventures are all beautifully captured in this brief memoir.
Omg, what a great finale to such a heart rending story. I loved it!
Exhausting read. With the little girl all the way and glad I read it
Even really difficult challenge is a bit wondrous from a kid's perspective. Thank you for sharing this. It's rather inspiring!
What a wonderful story, and funny too. I couldn't believe I was laughing at certain bits. But interesting that the author didn't take the route of a "miracle" type situation. And having 2 members of the family with a glass eye is freaky. Turning the disability into something electronic is sheer genius. No one else can do what they can. Wonderful. Thank you.
This is a lovely, vivid story which works well on so many levels.
What a moving piece of writing! Something similar has happened to a friend recently. Our eyes are very sensitive and it's unbelievable how helpless doctors still are if one has an eye condition.
Beautiful! Children are extraordinary.
This is an extraordinary story of the resilience, strength and courage that only the innocence of a child could possess.To endure and overcome the unimaginable and with such humour ,love and lighthearted belief in one’s destiny is truly humbling.I salute Ludo - Bravo!
I started reading this and couldn’t stop. The young protagonist is full of life despite the terrible pain and treatments she describes. I especially enjoyed the end when her father showed her how to make their eyes flash in a cinema, reversing a primarily serious situation into a fun one.
What a great, down to earth story, beautifully written