Free: A Child and a Country at the End of History
by Lea Ypi
A Time In History with Drastic Changes and Enormous Challenges (11/4/2021)
Free, written by Lea Ypi is a harrowing coming of age tale about the fall of socialism during the late 1980's to the early 1990's in Albania from the subjective vantage point of the narrator. The fall of socialism was, for a lot of people the end of decades of oppression and suppression at the hands of the government they relied on. We are introduced to the narrator through a weaving of secrets. These secrets were not specific to the personal challenges of family life and legacy but also in the greater expanse of the societal fishbowl they lived in. Readers are invited to experience the narrators coming of age tale at a place and time in history with drastic changes and enormous challenges. The Albanian people wanted real freedom and the recognition of political pluralism. "After centuries of servitude under the Ottoman Empire and decades of struggle against the great powers who wanted to partition the country".
The strengths of the narrative relied on the connections that it had to the events as they happened. Realizations were also a common theme. In the wake of the changing social landscape of Albania, the narrator experiences an internal culture shock in accepting that the ideals that she held in high regard were built on the oppression of her people and the suppression of their dissent. Demonstrations became protests and dissent became difference of opinion as the population was given the opportunity to express their distrust and disapproval of the hardships they experienced at the hands of their government. One of the instances where ideals clashed and the narrators view of society began to broaden is when she was inadvertently caught up in a protest. Running away from the police officers who were tasked with disbursing the protestors, the narrator stopped at a statue of Stalin, a statue that she found solace in before that moment. As she clung to the statue there was an awareness that the society that she lived in was just as hollow as the statue that she clung to.
There is a deep appreciation for this narrative because of its ability to humanize through the narrators subjective experience. We are able to feel what the narrator feels and experience their lives before and after the fall of socialism.
