one day: riassunto del libro, Appunti di Lingua Inglese

Scarica one day: riassunto del libro e più Appunti in PDF di Lingua Inglese solo su Docsity! ONE DAY – DAVID NICHOLLS, 2009 Part 1: 1988-1992: Early Twenties Chapter 1: The Future: Friday 15 July 1988, Edinburgh, Scotland Dexter Mayhem and Emma Morley (23 years old) spend a drunken night together after their graduation from the University of Edinburgh, in 1988. They talk about their plans for the future, how they will be once they are 40. Dex is interested in traveling while Em is more concerned with her long-term plans. Em observes Dex as he smokes a cigarette and notes that he is handsome, and she’s upset with herself for finding him so attractive. She tells him that she can picture him at forty, driving a sports car with his young, fourth wife. He is slightly offended at her vision of him. It becomes clear that they do not know each other very well. She tells him she knows his “type,” and implies that he’s a spoiled rich kid. Dex asks why she’s sleeping with him if she dislikes him so much. Emma goes into the bathroom, and Dex takes the opportunity to look around her room. Her apartment is small and shabby; she has lots of artsy photos and seems to be making a statement with all of her art and books. He views her room as a manifesto of sorts. He has spent a great deal of time with girls like Emma and finds them all the same. Dex’s vision of his future is not very clear. He hopes to be successful but mostly wants to have fun. Dex thinks this night at Em’s is bound to have repercussions, such as tears and awkward phone calls. He considers leaving, but then he finds a box of condoms and a half-smoked joint. While in the bathroom, Emma admits to herself that she has liked him since she first saw him four years ago, but she’s insecure about herself when she’s around him. She thinks this night might be a mistake, then she goes back to bed in her graduation cap and gown and asks him to cuddle. He complies, though he doesn’t really like cuddling. She suggests that they sleep and contemplates her own future: she doesn’t feel prepared, but she’s confident that she will be changing lives through art and writing. Emma also remembers her few sexual experiences which were not very exciting. Dex again considers leaving but instead stares at Emma’s face and how pretty she is. He tells her that, since it’s now dawn, it is St. Swithin’s Day and that if rain falls on St. Swithin’s grave, it will rain for the next forty days. She asks what he’s doing later, and he says nothing. They plan to do something together (even though Dex is a bit reluctant) and then fall asleep. While they do not become romantically involved completely, this is the beginning of their friendship. The novel visits their lives and their relationship on 15 July in successive years in each chapter, for 20 years. Chapter 2: Back to Life: 15 July 1989, Wolverhampton and Rome Emma is writing a letter to Dex from Wolverhampton about her experiences in a Theatre-in-Education piece that she’s performing there. The play she wrote is about slavery and is performed in schools for adolescents. She is working with Kwame, who plays a slave, Sid, who was on a popular television show, and Candy, a trashy actress who is waiting to be “discovered”. The play is not that successful. She writes to Dex to tell him about her life and ask how his summer in Rome is turning out. In the past year, she has made several bad choices. She joined an all-girl band, started and abandoned two novels, and had several retail jobs. She has also taken a Circus Skills course and discovered that she was not cut out for that. Emma moved home to her parents’, where they were concerned about her lack of direction, especially since she had done so well in college. She reveals that she went to Dexter’s family home with him after graduation, but she got drunk and yelled at his father that he was a fascist. They had met again in the spring at a mutual friend’s party, but Dex seemed only interested in friendship at that point. Then, Dex had begun traveling. Emma sent him long, detailed letters and he replied with postcards from party towns. Emma admits to herself that she would rather be in Rome in bed with Dex. Dex, in the meantime, is actually in bed with one of his English students, wondering what Emma would say if she saw him at that moment. He picks up his wristwatch, which lay on an unread copy of Primo Levi’s “If This is a Man” sent by Emma, and he goes to meet his mother, who asks him about his career, and we come to know that Dex has always wanted to become a photographer. His mother reminds him that he needs to get serious about life, that he’s an adult and he has to prepare himself. Chapter 3: The Taj Mahal: 15 July 1990, Bombay and Camden Town Emma has been working as a waitress in a Tex-Mex restaurant (“Loco Caliente”) in London form several months, and she’s showing a new employee, Ian, the ropes. Meanwhile, Dex has been fired from his job as a teacher and is now in Bombay, drunk, writing a 11-page letter to Emma in which he tells her that he thinks she’s scared of being happy and he reveals his affection for her. Dex urges her to spend a few months with him in India and offers to pay for everything. But he never mails the letter, because he leaves it in a bar in Bombay while leaving with some girl. On a train, he meets a TV producer and shows her his photographs, and the woman sees some potential in him and offers Dexter a job. Chapter 4: Opportunities: 15 July 1991, Camden Town and Primrose Hill Emma’s boss at the “Loco Caliente” offers her the job of restaurant manager, because he wants someone who isn’t going anywhere, someone reliable. She starts crying and thinking about all the times she applied for publishing jobs and was rejected, and her desire to go back to university, or to do voluntary work, which were both impossible to fulfil due to her lack of money. Then Emma finds the notebook in which she used to write poetry, and starts writing when Ian tells her that Dex, who is now a successful television presenter, is there. Dexter has got into the habit of showing up at Emma’s restaurant with all his girlfriends, to tell her about them and to convince her to give up her job. He even embarrasses Emma by pushing her to accept a tip, which she refuses. Then, Dex and Em go out for drinks, and after telling her about all his love conquests, Dexter offers to find Emma a job, but she turns him down and promises herself to tidy up her life. Chapter 5: The Rules of Engagement: 15 July 1992, The Dodecanese Islands, Greece Dex and Em are on a island-hopping holiday in the Greek Islands, and to keep the situation from becoming “complicated”, the two set a list of rules, The Rules of Engagement: they had to sleep in separate bedrooms, they couldn’t flirt neither with each other nor with other people, they couldn’t get naked and couldn’t play Scrabble or Boggle. However, on their second day, Dex lies to Em and tells her that he only found a room with one bedroom, and though Em is suspicious, they take the room and go to the beach. Dex goes out of his way to make Em break the rules: he tries to persuade her to take off her bathing suit as the other people on the beach are naked, he leaves the bathroom door open while he showers, he watches her undress and they get drunk. While they’re drinking, Em confesses that she had a crush on Dex in college. Then, they go to the beach and Dexter finally convinces Emma to skinny-dip and he admits that he liked her too in college and that he still fancies her at the moment, but he also says tells her he’s not ready for a relationship and that they can just have a bit of fun, “their little secret”. Emma rejects him (“if you have to keep something secret it’s because you shouldn’t be doing it in the first place”), and then Dex changes the subject, because some kids are stealing his clothes. Because of that, Dex has to go back to the hotel with a plastic sack around his waist. When they get to their room, everything goes back to the way it was before. Part 2: 1993-1995: Late Twenties Chapter 6: Chemical: 15 July 1993, (Dexter’s Story) Brixton, Earls Court and Oxfordshire Dexter is drunk and about to head out of a club to go to Emma’s house to tell her his feelings, when one of his new friends suggest that they all spend the night at his place. As soon as morning comes, Dex gets out of the house. While he’s going to visit his parents, as his mother has been sick for some time, he almost has a car accident, because he’s drunk and on drugs. After staying for some time, his father forbids him for driving and gives him a lift to the station instead, and warns him not to come back drunk again. Then, Dex uses the payphone to call Emma, who is in about to go on a date. She now owns a coffee shop (cafetière) and has