Leonora Read Online Free
Book: Leonora Read Online Free
Author: Elena Poniatowska
could lead her?
âThe moon is a desert with craters on it,â Pat informs her.
There is no way to get through to the young Leonora. Those who know her and make the attempt have no inkling of what will happen next. She laughs only occasionally, which is why Father OâConnor enjoys seeing her smile and hearing her giggle. When she tells him the human race is in no way superior to the equine one, she convinces him it is as she says.
3
THE HOLY SEPULCHRE
H AROLD CARRINGTON SUMMONS his daughter to the library.
âYour mother and I have decided to send you to convent school.â
A child is powerless. Once the adults have made a decision they point at the door and say: âAway to the convent with you!â and in so doing, they divest themselves of the child.
âYour education is costing us more than your brothersâ,â Maurie pleads, placating her with the explanation: âOne has to be strict with children, to see them properly educated; if one is lax, they can go to rack and ruin.â
The Convent of the Holy Sepulchre occupies a palace built for Henry VIII at Newhall near Chelmsford, the town in Essex where Oscar Wilde was incarcerated.
The vast dormitory hardly inspires confidence. The windows are narrow and it is impossible to see outside without climbing on to a chair, except that there are no chairs, other than the night matronâs, which looks as if it collapsed sometime around a thousand years BC. The length of the two side walls are hung with curtains made of a cloth that resembles linoleum to divide off the beds with their thin mattresses and hard pillows. The first thing the girls do after their morning genuflections is to empty their chamber pots.
âDonât you complain. All of us just sleep on a board on a bare floor and we fast, and we put crowns of thorns on our heads for the love of Jesus Christ during Holy Week. Look, Iâve still got the scars here,â one of the novices explains to Leonora.
âSilence!â commands the Mother Superior.
What do you do with silence? To begin with, Leonora gulps it down. At Crookhey Hall she used to talk to Nanny and Gerard. Now she knows that silence is solitude.
Tables as long as Lent are the first thing you see on entering the refectory. Sisters wearing white caps and aprons serve the girls swiftly. The Mother Superior sits at the head of the table and reads loudly from the Bible. The only sound is that of spoons scraping the bottom of soup plates. How convenient that in such a tedious place the sisters get lunch over and done with quickly!
âIâve just seen a griffin.â
âThere are no griffins here.â The nun is getting annoyed.
âYes there are. In the corners of the chapel ⦠Or maybe itâs just Father Carpenter, half lion and half eagle.â
The nuns huddle inside their black habits. To Leonora, walking behind them, their backs look like a pack of wild boar.
In class, told how Moses parted the Red Sea and Joshua caused the sun to pause on its path to its zenith, she thinks: âI could do that.â Cosmic laws are a natural part of her life.
âWe have to cut your hair.â
âNo.â
âYour hair is the cause of your vanity.â
Ebony curls fall to the floor, forming a ring around Leonora, whose tears are tumbling out. She attempts to wipe them away with a lock of hair as she used to, but there isnât any left long enough. Finally, the nun takes pity on her:
âYou look pretty with this haircut.â
âI look hideous.â
Where are you, Lake Windermere? Where are you, Nanny?
The saints and martyrs in the chapel are fantastical beings who fly from one plinth to the next. A lion about to devour one of the first female Christian martyrs pauses beneath the ferocity of her glare and, instead of eating her up, throws himself at her feet imploring mercy. St. Patrick opens his arms to her, St. Ursula weeps salt tears, and in the convent
âThe moon is a desert with craters on it,â Pat informs her.
There is no way to get through to the young Leonora. Those who know her and make the attempt have no inkling of what will happen next. She laughs only occasionally, which is why Father OâConnor enjoys seeing her smile and hearing her giggle. When she tells him the human race is in no way superior to the equine one, she convinces him it is as she says.
3
THE HOLY SEPULCHRE
H AROLD CARRINGTON SUMMONS his daughter to the library.
âYour mother and I have decided to send you to convent school.â
A child is powerless. Once the adults have made a decision they point at the door and say: âAway to the convent with you!â and in so doing, they divest themselves of the child.
âYour education is costing us more than your brothersâ,â Maurie pleads, placating her with the explanation: âOne has to be strict with children, to see them properly educated; if one is lax, they can go to rack and ruin.â
The Convent of the Holy Sepulchre occupies a palace built for Henry VIII at Newhall near Chelmsford, the town in Essex where Oscar Wilde was incarcerated.
The vast dormitory hardly inspires confidence. The windows are narrow and it is impossible to see outside without climbing on to a chair, except that there are no chairs, other than the night matronâs, which looks as if it collapsed sometime around a thousand years BC. The length of the two side walls are hung with curtains made of a cloth that resembles linoleum to divide off the beds with their thin mattresses and hard pillows. The first thing the girls do after their morning genuflections is to empty their chamber pots.
âDonât you complain. All of us just sleep on a board on a bare floor and we fast, and we put crowns of thorns on our heads for the love of Jesus Christ during Holy Week. Look, Iâve still got the scars here,â one of the novices explains to Leonora.
âSilence!â commands the Mother Superior.
What do you do with silence? To begin with, Leonora gulps it down. At Crookhey Hall she used to talk to Nanny and Gerard. Now she knows that silence is solitude.
Tables as long as Lent are the first thing you see on entering the refectory. Sisters wearing white caps and aprons serve the girls swiftly. The Mother Superior sits at the head of the table and reads loudly from the Bible. The only sound is that of spoons scraping the bottom of soup plates. How convenient that in such a tedious place the sisters get lunch over and done with quickly!
âIâve just seen a griffin.â
âThere are no griffins here.â The nun is getting annoyed.
âYes there are. In the corners of the chapel ⦠Or maybe itâs just Father Carpenter, half lion and half eagle.â
The nuns huddle inside their black habits. To Leonora, walking behind them, their backs look like a pack of wild boar.
In class, told how Moses parted the Red Sea and Joshua caused the sun to pause on its path to its zenith, she thinks: âI could do that.â Cosmic laws are a natural part of her life.
âWe have to cut your hair.â
âNo.â
âYour hair is the cause of your vanity.â
Ebony curls fall to the floor, forming a ring around Leonora, whose tears are tumbling out. She attempts to wipe them away with a lock of hair as she used to, but there isnât any left long enough. Finally, the nun takes pity on her:
âYou look pretty with this haircut.â
âI look hideous.â
Where are you, Lake Windermere? Where are you, Nanny?
The saints and martyrs in the chapel are fantastical beings who fly from one plinth to the next. A lion about to devour one of the first female Christian martyrs pauses beneath the ferocity of her glare and, instead of eating her up, throws himself at her feet imploring mercy. St. Patrick opens his arms to her, St. Ursula weeps salt tears, and in the convent