This story is set on an Italian island named Capri. It all began when the narrator visited a friend on this island.
We are not told much about the narrator but we realise his friend was a close acquaintance of a man called Wilson, who is the main character of this short story. Through a first conversation between the unknown narrator and his friend we learn about the peculiar life story of this man, Wilson, who moved to the island after he had fallen in love with it when he had visited it during a holiday some years before.
Wilson’s heart-rending story was on everyone's lips on Capri. Of course, each islander put their own gloss to the story. Everybody aired their views on the matter even though nobody was pretty sure of its validity. The narrator was bowled over by Wilson’s personal life so he decided to meet with him so as to find out whether all people’s comments were true or just hearsay.
Ok, I won’t keep you in this nail-biting suspense. I’ll go straight to the point - Wilson’s particular life story.
Wilson gave up his hectic and humdrum life as a bank manager in London and decided to live a life of pleasure and leisure on Capri. His wife had died of bronchopneumonia. They had had a child who was brought up by Wilson’s mother-in-law after the child’s mother had died. Eventually the child died because of blood-poisoning. Wilson put the blame on his mother-in-law for not looking after the child properly. We learn through his own statements that he had little affection for his family. As it says in the story: “…all so peaceful and beautiful, I said to myself, well, after all, what should I go back? It wasn’t as if I had someone dependent on me. My wife had died… and the kid went to live with her grandmother. She was an old fool, she didn’t look after the kid properly … and she died.” “I was cut up at the time, though of course not so much as if the kid had been living with me”. His life was a kind of selfish existence.He never even wondered whether leaving his daughter alone with her grandmother was a good decision because he only cared about his own happiness.He wanted to live for himself.
He traded a life of dull and monotonous routine in London for an ordinary and easy life on Capri. All he wanted was carefree days far away from the daily grind of his work. As Wilson himself says: “All I had to look forward to was doing the same old thing day after day till I retired on my pension. I said to myself, is it worth it? What’s wrong with chucking it all up and spending the rest of my life down here? “ “… All the time I was working I kept thinking of the bathing here and the vineyards and the walks over the hills and the moon and the sea…”. His plan was to live for twenty-five years on Capri on the money he had saved; he had bought an annuity to last twenty-five years and then he was going to commit suicide, but he ran out of money before planned. So, he borrowed sums of money not to pay what he owed but to continue his life of enjoyment. When things became worse because of his impossibility to pay the rent, he tried to commit suicide. He lit a fire at home and he locked himself there, but he failed. He didn’t die. As a result, he was not in complete possession of his faculties; he became a sort of insane. Wilson continued living in this condition for 6 years until he finally died. His death was not so horrible; he died naturally; apparently in his sleep.
The narrator doesn’t make his death so miserable because Wilson died watching what he loved the most-the breathtaking landscape of Capri and its beautiful sea.
I believe this story clearly depicts a man who had not a great love of life. He didn’t care dying because he felt he had done everything he had to. However, he always neglected his primary duty: to look after his daughter. He was egocentric and self-serving. He was not interested in other people’s lives, not even his family’s life but his own. He didn’t mind quitting everything and starting living a life of his own. He didn’t dote on his family. He was constantly pointing out their failings without accepting his own.
It seems to me that love does not only imply feeling love for oneself and caring about oneself but also caring for someone with devotion. Wilson was indifferent to his family. He only cared about his well-being and happiness. Quite consciously, he set his sights on his joy of life despite having to shirk his duties and responsibilities. He was a self-centred person.
However, at the end of the story we learn that he didn’t even love himself. A person who decides to end with his own life doesn’t have dignity or self-respect.
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