Captain Corelli's Mandolin - Diary entries by Pelagia and Mandras.

Teppei Kubo 304 Hn

English Literature:

Captain Corelli’s Mandolin

Diary entries by Pelagia and Mandras

1. Pelagia

It is times like this that I feel most free. I am so glad that I can share my thoughts and open my heart to you like I do to you. You are the only one that will actually listen to me rather than just hear me, which is why I can speak about my real feelings for Mandras. I really love him, I do. But I still don’t feel we’re communicating like we should do. It’s just like the usual man and woman relationship, and that isn’t what I want. Papakis says that there shouldn’t be any discussions about things like war and Mussolini but I always wonder why not. Do all women end up as domestic slaves without ever being able to express their opinions about the world? Whenever I try to talk to Mandras about war, he’s either up an olive tree pretending to be Tarzan, or he just laughs and kisses me and tells me how much he loves me. I love him too… of course, but I just feel that our relationship can be something completely different to what it is now. Oh, I nearly forgot… he did something today that made me drop all my medicines that I was meant to give to Papakis and nearly made me die of laughter at the same time. He was doing monkey impressions up an olive tree…you had to be there to find it as funny as I did. Oh I love him so much…

1. Mandras

I am in love! Pelagia… oh she is so beautiful. I can’t wait until I marry her… we will have such a good time together. There is one problem… I still haven’t sought her father’s consent. He keeps on asking me to ask him but I can never actually ask him because I know that he thinks I am just a fool… an idiot that likes to play boyish games, which I suppose to some extent is true. One minute, I may be up in an olive tree being Tarzan, and the next minute I may ...

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1. Mandras

I am in love! Pelagia… oh she is so beautiful. I can’t wait until I marry her… we will have such a good time together. There is one problem… I still haven’t sought her father’s consent. He keeps on asking me to ask him but I can never actually ask him because I know that he thinks I am just a fool… an idiot that likes to play boyish games, which I suppose to some extent is true. One minute, I may be up in an olive tree being Tarzan, and the next minute I may be pretending to have a fight a goat, which I suppose is quite boyish, but what does he expect? Does the doctor really expect me to talk to Pelagia about politics and opinions about war? Women aren’t interested in those sort of things… we all know that! They just want to be entertained by men. That’s why I act like I do most of the time. But I don’t want to spend the rest of my life entertaining and showing off… I also want to accomplish something in my life; something big… something to be remembered by, like the great Jason, who went on the quest for the Golden Fleece. This is why I want a war… so that I can prove to Pelagia that I am a man… by becoming a soldier. And one day, I will do this. If there is a war, I will make sure that I return safely to Pelagia and prove to her that I am not just a twelve-year-old boy, but a man.
2. Pelagia

Mandras has been gone for nearly 3 months now. Cephallonia seems dead without all the young men on the island have gone to war and the tempest continues. It is now just a dismal place…like my heart. I cannot breathe while Mandras is gone. The absence of him in my life makes every second more painful to bear and my nightmares of him are killing me. The dreams I have at night of the things that could have happened to him makes my brains burn. I have written to him almost a hundred times now but he still hasn’t written back. He must have not got my letters or he must have replied but his letters haven’t got to me due to the war. Still it makes me feel petrified when I think of the other reasons why he may not be writing back…Oh Gods of Mount Aenos, please return my Mandras safely back to me. I am so worried about him. Oh God, is there nothing I can do? Should I just wait here and grow old… or should I be doing more than just making scarves and socks for him? Papakis says that there is nothing we can do apart from pray… to pray for your return, your safety, and God’s mercy. The tempest continues…

2. Mandras

What have I become? To do such a thing! I have killed a man… I HAVE KILLED A MAN! Why? Just so that I could join the local branch of ELAS. What was I thinking? At first I felt that this was the apparent direction to my journey, but now I feel that I have never had a sense of direction…as though I cannot direct myself in life. I was just a wanderer like Odysseus and look what it has led to. The death of a man for which I am responsible. It is too late now… I have committed murder. Oh Lord, what should I do? Why can I not control my desire for power? I cannot describe how it felt… killing a man. But I could feel all the rage throughout my whole life just let out by murdering this one man. Strangely, it made me feel clean… but at the same time, I could feel the corruption in me. It was an odd sensation . What will Pelagia think? The man that went to war to become a man, but became a monster…

3. Pelagia

3. Madras

I retuned to Cephallonia today, and the Pelagia I saw today was different to the one I knew before. When I first saw her, she did not even recognise me. Not my voice, not my body, not even me. This is what a horrible man I have become… a monster without even a heart that my Pelagia used to love. Our connection has gone. Her first words still painfully echo in my head. “My father’s out. He should be back tomorrow”. The thought of our separation hurts me more than all the pains of my wounds on my body. Psipsina was the first to realise who I was. Pelagia just saw me as a wild stranger… wounded and corrupted. I have become a product of war… a desolate ghost. To her, I am a dead man, and there is nothing I can do about it. Pelagia seemed happy without me… and I will never have her again. My dream of Pelagia was better than Pelagia herself. Or maybe it is me… maybe I have changed and Pelagia is living her usual life without me. Maybe I have no one to blame but myself. But I know that I will have to live the rest of my life without her… I will never be warm again.