Doeschka Meijsing
Over de liefde
Winner AKO Literature Prize 2008
The departure of her third great love after twelve years together has left Philippa, Pip to those close to her, in a state of all-consuming rage. She is unable to do anything, and particularly the fact that Jula is now with a man fuels her rage – and her sorrow, from which she defends herself by looking at herself ironically, almost cynically – ‘Something in me had decided that the time of crying was over and there I stood, obediently stiff and stern.’
A documentary takes her back inevitably to her first great love, her gymnastics teacher at secondary school. Which was more than a teen-age crush: it was the episode in her life made her aware of her lesbian nature. Recovering after a strange accident, Pip attempts to understand her love life. What about her second love? How can it be that Jula is now in a heterosexual relationship? When her fury gives way to introspection, there is room for the second storyline: Pip’s relationship with her family, especially with her brothers, who make their presence felt and with whom she visits the family house in Italy.
In a detached, often witty style – the end is especially hilarious, yet also moving – Meijsing portrays a woman of around fifty bouncing back, resuming her life, strengthened both physically and psychologically.
