the letters they didn’t read
Last year I created a new goal: read more stories about LGBTQI+, including authors and subjects. First, I did a quick look on Google, and Amazon UK bought one or two but kept my research; there are where I found ‘Swimming in the dark’ at three floors Waterstones store on Leicester Square in central London.
Walking through the store, I asked t middle-aged seller if they have a shelf just for LGBTQI+ literature, and to my surprise, the man who attended me, also gay, told me, ‘We don’t have a shelf, book a simple table if some samples, I show you.’ I was shocked & happy at the same time. It will do easier my research. I stood there for forty minutes when the seller went back and offered help to choose the book. I told him what I was looking for and what I wanted to read. Gently, he said: ‘go for this one he gives to a copy of Swimming in the Dark.
‘Is it complex English?’, I sked
‘No’, he said to me.
I explained to him why I was asking him this, ‘I still cannot read in English; so, I need to buy a book where that has an Amazon Audible available.’
He agreed, moving his head, and said: ‘trust me, you will like this one.’
I left the store downloading the audiobook. I took the Piccadilly Line on my way home, and before I started my travel, I was listing Robert Nairne guiding through the pages of intense letters from Ludzio.
The history of Jedrowski is intense, political, and necessary. The reading of Nairne does not take more than six hours to finish all books.
The narrative voice places us inside a private habitation, where we can feel and watch the love story of Ludwik and Janusz, place in Communist Poland in the ’80s. The novel touch distinct aspects of the gay life in Poland and, not pronouncing straight away, talks about ‘Operation Hyacinth,’ where the government was hunting LGBTQI+ (just for curiosity, you can watch a movie with a similar subject on Netflix that takes the exact name of the operation). The unique narrative of Tomasz Jedrowski brings out the ambivalence, the challenges and curiosity about how life can be ambiguous.
I came from a childhood where my parents needed to fight for their rights. Between 2000 and 2010, a capitalist country, as Brazil, was leaving days of changing: I could study in a better school, went to the best university from the language in Brazil, where I learned Spanish as my second language. These few words keep you in context because this background makes me question the life of Ludwik and Janusz in Poland. The general politics in Brazil helped me learn how to read an English book that the characters need to hide from similar political actions. I know this comment may sound like an ignorant person, and I am sorry about that.
Swimming in the Dark is a love story, but it is also about the concept of freedom in three ways: the first from the point of view of Ludwik; the second from Janusz, and the last one, mine (or yours if you have a similar background like me), where I start making questions about lifestyle and privileges in 2000 in Brazil.
If you are looking for lgbtqi+ reading, Jedrowski is my recommendation. His first book will not take long to you to read and also, you will also learn how to be free when you swim.
