Text/Pan Caixia
Who is Farage? Her full name is Oliana Farage, and she is a well-known War correspondent in Italy who has covered the Vietnam War, the Middle East War, the South African Unrest, and so on;
She interviewed political titans such as Deng Xiaoping and Kissinger, and was known for her "sharp, aggressive, bombing interrogations," which caused headaches for politicians around the world.
Farage never compromised on any difficulty, in any power. And the only compromise in her life was for love.
01
On August 23, 1973, Farage walked out of Athens Airport. It was the height of summer, and she was wearing a shirt and trousers, and her clothes were instantly soaked with sweat.
The purpose of her trip was to interview Alysanda Panaguris, the leader of the Greek resistance movement, whom people called Alekos.
His story, she already knew. He was originally a poet, but he devoted himself to politics, and at the age of 29, he was imprisoned for 5 years and tortured for an attempted murder of a tyrant.
However, burns, whip marks, and electrocution could not make him submit, and in the face of hellish torture, he never changed his face. Finally, under the pressure of international public opinion, those in power had to release him.
He is a man who stands tall in the sky, and Farage can't wait to see him. But when she got into the taxi, she was inexplicably a little uneasy, anticipating that something was going to happen.
On that day, Alekos's home was crowded with people, and although they had never seen a picture of him before, their eyes met at once.
He was very ordinary, not very tall, with a beard, black eyes shining, because of the long detention, his face was pale and morbid.
Before she could say anything, he had already greeted her: "You are finally here!" ”
Unexpectedly, he spoke Italian, Farage's native language. This sound made Farage suddenly lose his calm.
Ignoring her surprise, he dragged her through the crowd, straight into the bedroom, shoved a large bouquet of roses into her hand, and said, "To you!" The tone was tough and domineering.
During the 5 years of captivity, he had read Farage's books and even went on many hunger strikes in order to get her books. The scene of the meeting, he had fantasized countless times.
In that earthen cell of less than two square meters, he also taught himself Italian so that he could talk directly with her one day.
Portrait of Alekos
In Alekos's calm narration, Farage was stunned. Something in him both appealed to her and made her creepy.
In inexplicable apprehension, she began the interview. To hide herself, she avoided his gaze, and the tone of her questions was always cold and professional.
At the age of 44, Farage is mature and charming, and Alekos's heart flutters. During the interview, he answered her questions and couldn't help but shake her hand, and she had to try to withdraw her hand and hide under the coffee table.
But as the narration progressed, looking at his hands twisted by ropes, his feet crushed by the tiger's stool, and the flower-like scars on his face, Farage surrendered.
Feeling his pain, she stopped dodging and let him hold her hand. At this time, she heard him say, "I love love, the love of the heart." ”
The interview lasted from noon to night, and facing Alekos, Farage had a feeling: they had seen it a hundred times.
She had a heroic complex, her father had been a member of the Italian resistance, grew up in the war, and she, like Alekos, hated fascism to the extreme.
She had always rejected love, but at that moment, she was sure that Alekos was the hero of her dreams.
On farewell, Alekos asked angrily, "Why didn't we meet earlier?" When I set off mines, when they tortured me, tortured me, prosecuted me, sentenced me to death, and imprisoned me in that grave, where were you? ”
Farage, on the other hand, was guilty, as if it was really her fault that they were too late to meet. In the interview draft that day, she changed sharply and spoke warmly:
"His face was like the face of a crucified Jesus, and he looked older than he was 34 years old. His pale cheeks were carved with a few wrinkles, a few strands of silver were revealed between his jet-black hair, and his eyes were like two pools of melancholy water. ”
War correspondent Farage
02
The day after leaving Athens, Farage received a telegram: "I am waiting for you. ”
On the third and fourth day, the telegram came again. A week later, it was a letter. The letter said he was admitted to the hospital and attached a short poem: "Forgotten love, revived and brought me back into life." ”
The devil sent a spell, and Farage immediately canceled his ticket to New York and flew to Alekos. This time, she discovered his witty, optimistic side, and she was struck.
In his shabby room, she listened to him read poetry, intoxicated and happy. When they hugged each other, Alekos said softly, "I have always felt very lonely, I don't want to go down alone anymore, promise me, you will never abandon me." ”
In fact, Farage is well aware that the pardon of Alekos is only a trick played by those in power, and even if he is released, he is always under surveillance and danger.
However, she still inevitably fell in love. When he asked in a demonic voice, "I need a partner who can be my comrades, friends, comrades-in-arms and brothers, will you help me?" She replied without resistance: "Of course." ”
Alekos begins don Quixote absurdity, making plans to wrestle with imaginary enemies and walk with Farage with explosives on his body;
He ignores the police car tracking, puts her in danger, and takes pleasure in it;
He also plotted to flee Greece, arbitrarily demanding that she prepare a yacht, and when she sensibly advised, he yelled at her: "You don't love me!" ”
Farage
In Greece, Alekos could be persecuted at any time, and despite the dangers, Farage took him to Italy.
The lightning of love alarmed the entire Western world, and her residence in Rome was under surveillance.
To avoid surveillance, she took him into seclusion in a jungle hut and, like a normal housewife, washed and cooked for him.
During that time, Alekos regained a brief moment of calm, and at Farage's suggestion, he wrote columns for newspapers and compiled poems from prison.
They also swapped rings, and soon she was pregnant with his child.
However, the exile status upset Alekos, and finally one day, plainclothes outside the window irritated him. As he rushed to the door, Farage was desperate to stop him, turning his anger to her and kicking her in the stomach.
The child was miscarried, Farage was in great pain, and she appealed to the end of her deep maternal love and wrote "Letter to an Unborn Child". Despite Alekos's tyranny and rudeness, she still wanted her child to be like him.
Normal life and work are disrupted, and quarrels inevitably occur.
During that time, Alekos often did not say goodbye and tried to escape back to Greece, and Farage was tortured. But whenever he shouted "It's me, it's me" on the phone, she accepted him again and again.
03
With the coup d'état in Greece and the fall of the junta, Alekos decided to return home to run for parliament.
Farage did not hesitate to support him, raise money for him, accompany him on the blade of the knife, and several times, almost forced to die by his opponents.
After Alekos was elected to parliament, he was obsessed with finding military police files to expose the defense minister who held military power.
Farage gave up important interviews and stayed with him in Athens, sharing threats of intimidation with him. She knew that she would fail, but for the freedom and justice he sought, she always accompanied him.
She alleviated his loneliness, but she herself was physically and mentally exhausted.
However, politics is rife with pitfalls, and Alekos is extremely uncomfortable. He was often hysterical, stopped reading and writing poetry, and gradually became addicted to alcoholism, and even began to look for flowers and ask for willows.
Disappointed, Farage returned to Rome. Unexpectedly, Alekos tracked him down, he had smelled the breath of death, and he missed the jungle hut they had lived in seclusion together.
Farage compromised again. In that hut, they listened to music and danced, as if they were back to the sweetness of their first love.
In peace, Alekos concentrated on writing, but in his mind, new struggles were always brewing.
Sure enough, when he reached page 23, he stopped and said to Farage in an indisputable tone: "You write it, promise me, you will swear!" ”
A few days later, he said goodbye to her again, at the airport, where he said, "You're a good partner, the only partner I've ever had." ”
When the news of his death came 24 days later, he was killed in a bizarre car accident at the age of 37. It was May 1, 1976.
Seventeen hours later, Farage saw Alekos in the morgue and exchanged rings with his cold fingers, as he had done three years earlier.
After his death, she quit her job at The European, locked herself up, and continued his unfinished manuscript.
His soul had been implanted in her body, and in order to experience his pain, she went to the cell where he was being held, "as small as a grave";
She recalled every detail of their relationship, re-understood him, examined him;
She unplugged the phone line, didn't communicate with anyone except a few close friends, and relied on 60 cigarettes a day to write until she was exhausted.
Exactly three years later, the 400,000-word "Man" came out, and on the title page, there were three words of affection: dedicated to you.
In the prologue, she calls him "the only one who can pour out his heart." In her pen, a tragic hero once again stands up vividly, and the monument lives on forever.
Manhood by Farage
For this love, Farage said: "At some point in my life, there was a miracle: I met Alekos, I fell in love with him, and he fell in love with me. This is not a casual love, but an extremely great love. ”
The most important person in life is gone, and Farage is no longer involved in love. She lived in New York for many years afterward.
In 2001, after the events of 9/11 in the United States, she wrote an 80,000-word essay for the Italian press, "Anger and Pride," which became "one of the most shocking events in the history of European journalism."
In September 2006, Farage was terminally ill with cancer, and she flew back to Florence from New York, and throughout the journey, she was thin and shrunk in her seat motionless.
In the memory, Alekos's voice resounded again: "If there is no death, any love in the world will become a passing smoke cloud." ”
Because of death, love lives forever.
A few days later, with the sound of church bells, Farage passed away at the age of 77.