Neither Here nor There: Redirecting the Homeward Gaze in Nino Ricci's 'Lives of the Saints', 'In a Glass House' and Where She Has Gone

ABSTRACT/RESUME This paper argues that Nino Ricci's trilogy moves beyond the nostalgia for an originary and expresses instead a nostalgia for origins in a new home--for origins in Canada rather than Italy. Ricci uses his trilogy to refute the myth of a homogenous Canadian identity by giving voice to the experiences, both personal and communal, of Italians in Canada. The trilogy explores the complex process of forging an authenticating mythology that will allow Italian migrants and their descendants to add their stories to Canada's national narrative while establishing their place in the nation. Ricci offers, however, no definitive conclusions, for the trilogy ends in a liminal space that reveals his own ambivalence toward the very kind of myth-making strategy in which he engages. Cette etude presente l'idee que les immigrants italiens dans la trilogie de Nino Ricci n'expriment pas une nostalgie pour leur pays natal, mats expriment plutot le desir de revivre l'experience de l'etablissement de la culture italienne dans leur pays adoptive, le Canada. Ricci utilise ses oeuvres pour refuter le mythe d'une seule identite canadienne. Il l'expres a travers les experiences personnelles et commun-autaires des Italiens au Canada. La trilogie examine le processus complexe de l'etablissement d'une mythologie authentique, qui permettra aux immigrants italiens et leurs progenitures d'ajouter leurs histoires a celles du patrimoine canadien, tout en etablissant leur place au pays. Mais la trilogie n'aboutie pas a aucune conclusion decisive a cause de l'ambiguite personnelle de l'auteur envers ce sujet. The novels of Nino Ricci's trilogy Lives of the Saints (1990), a Glass House (1993), and Where She Has Gone (1997)--express a nostalgic longing for a particular moment in Canada's past: a migrant's arrival and settlement in a new land. Derived from the Greek nostos, which signifies a return home, and algos, which refers to suffering or pain, nostalgia is a powerful impulse that awakens a bittersweet longing for the past, even for a past that evokes painful memories, since these memories show those who have suffered that they have the capacity to endure. (1) David Lowenthal observes that nostalgic longings are becoming increasingly common in Western societies, and he postulates that a mistrust of the future fuels much of today's nostalgia (1985, 11). Yet he explains, If nostalgia is a symptom of malaise, it also has compensating virtues. Attachment to familiar places may buffer social upheaval, attachment to familiar faces may be necessary for enduring association (1985, 13). Daniel Francis reinforces this point when he writes, In an age of anxiety, it is not surprising to find nostalgia flourishing (1997, 176). For Canadian writers from different ethno-cultural backgrounds, a nostalgic return to an immigrant past can be a means of establishing roots in this land. While nostalgia has traditionally played a central role in ethnic literature, this longing has typically rested on a nostalgic desire to journey toward an originary home (Kamboureli 2000, 132). The novels of Ricci's trilogy, however, move beyond this nostalgia for a lost homeland and express instead a nostalgia for a different kind of origins for origins in the new land, for the originary moment when Italian immigrants arrived and settled in Canada. What Ricci's novels reveal is that the creation of an authenticating mythology is dependent upon the assertion of these originary moments. For a mythology to be authenticating, it must reconstruct and reimagine genuine historical events. It must, in other words, lay claim to verifiable historical origins. For example, in his trilogy, Ricci creates an authenticating mythology that reconstructs the historical realities of Italian migration to Canada and thus offers his ethnic group a genuine sense of belonging in the nation. Yet even as he recovers these origins, he questions historical truths and blurs the boundaries between fact and fiction. …

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