Four Walls
Vangelis Hatziyannidis
Translated by Anne-Marie Stanton-Ife
Reviewed by Barb Radmore
Walls can come in many forms. In his debut (2001) novel, Four Walls,
Greek author Vangelis Hatziyannidis has written a story
that encompasses walls in all their many guises.
E. Rodakis is the son of the famous honey maker S. Rodakis. After
his father's death, Rodakis follows his dream of traveling, only to
return to his childhood home on a small Greek island. He lives a
solitary life.
surrounded by his father's books and family possessions. His
quiet life is disturbed when the village priest requests that he allows
a
stranger to take refuge in his home. The beaten and lame woman, Vaya,
arrives and
takes up residence in his house. At first it is difficult for Rodakis,
a
man who wants none of his possessions moved an inch, to adapt to this
situation. But as he becomes more accustomed to the woman's presence,
he and Vaya come
to
an understanding. With Vaya feeling safe from her past behind the walls
of his home, Rodakis becomes aware of Rosa, her secret daughter she has
kept hidden in a trunk. A family of sorts, Rodakis, Vaya and
Rosa, emerges based only on proximity and familiarity. It is the
decision to attempt a re-entry into the honey making business
that
solidifies their relationship. Vaya
leads their quest for the ideal combination of plants that will meld
into the perfect honey. She succeeds and their honey becomes known
far and wide; it is a delicacy sold for riches. Called "Anglico"- made
by
angels- it attracts the attentions of those who wish to own the secret
recipe for themselves. As Vaya finds herself drawn to explore the world
outside of the estate, so the world begins to find its way inside the
estate, to change their lives forever.
Rodakis is trapped in a world of his own making, the four walls of his
house, walled in by his possessions and then walled in by the morals of
society. His emotional and spiritual walls give way to physical
as the world intrudes into his honey making secrets. When both Vaya and
Rodakis go missing, Rosa is forced to leave the estate. She must
leave
the only home she has ever known, to seek out a father she did not know
existed. It is there that she discovers that the perimeters of her
unusual
upbringing are considered horribly wrong by others. She retreats behind
her bedroom walls where she feels comfortable and safe from a world
whose boundaries she does not understand.
Four Walls is able to be both a rousing good story with ample doses
of violence, tension and sex while also being a serious study of
the affect of both physical and hidden walls on the human spirit.
As the
book begins the narrator wanders between past and present,
interspersing the story with anecdotes from the past in seemingly
random
sequence. This is a difficult feat to maintain within the
direction
of the plot but it is one that Hatziyannidis manages superbly. Part of
the intrigue is to watch all the various pieces of the past
wander back into the story at various points, to sit there and say
"told you I belonged" to the reader. It is a book of subtleties and
surprises, a slim book that tells the story of a saga.
This has been translated from Greek by Anne-Marie Stanton-Ife, a
teacher and translator who currently lives in Athens
Thsi book will be available September 18, 2006. We can now also
look forward to Hatziyannidis' next novel "Stolen
Time" to be available through Marion Boyer's Publishing January 2007.
In it he continues his exploration of how people react when imprisoned
behind walls.