Summary
Highlights
The poem 'La casa dei doganieri' dates back to 1930 and was later included in Montale's 1939 collection 'Le occasioni.' It is structured into four stanzas of five or six verses, many of which are hendecasyllables or combinations of shorter verses. Montale addresses a woman named Annetta, or Arletta, a holidaymaker he met in Liguria who died young. Montale clarifies that she might not even recall his existence, and her real name was Anna degli Uberti.
The first stanza begins with Montale addressing Anna degli Uberti, saying, 'You do not remember the customs officers' house on the cliff, desolate, awaiting you since the evening your swarm of thoughts entered and rested restless.' This immediately establishes a tone of memory and loss, personifying the house and using 'swarm of thoughts' as a metaphor. The phrase 'Tu non ricordi' is an anaphora that will recur throughout the poem.
Montale continues by describing how the 'Libeccio' (south-west wind) has weathered the old walls, and 'the sound of your laughter is no longer joyful.' The compass goes 'madly adrift,' and the 'calculation of the dice no longer returns,' serving as objective correlatives for the poet's disorientation and the unpredictability of life. The recurring 'Tu non ricordi' emphasizes the fragmented nature of memory, like a 'thread of life unraveling.'
The poet holds 'one end of the thread,' suggesting a lingering connection to the past, but the house 'moves away into the past,' and the weather vane 'spins mercilessly' on the roof, symbolizing continuous disorientation. The horizon 'flees' and the light of a tanker appears rarely, representing a fading hope. The question 'Il varco è qui?' (Is the passage here?) suggests a yearning for an escape, but the waves breaking on the cliff indicate that such a passage remains unreachable. The poem concludes with the poignant lines: 'You do not remember the house of this my evening, and I do not know who goes and who remains,' highlighting the poet's profound sense of bewilderment and existential uncertainty.
The poem is rich in metaphorical images and objective correlatives, such as the 'swarm of thoughts,' the 'mad compass,' the 'dice that yield wrong results,' and the 'unraveling thread of memory.' Montale addresses Annetta, who doesn't remember their fictional encounter at the customs officers' house, a place that was already destroyed in his childhood. This fiction serves to explore themes of lost memory and the irretrievability of the past. The comparison to Leopardi's Silvia highlights the recurring motif of a young life cut short and the poet's regrets. Montale’s 'Tu non ricordi' echoes Leopardi’s 'Silvia, rimembri ancora?'
The anaphora 'Tu non ricordi' ties the poem together, as the poet tries to retrace the 'thread of memories.' Unlike Proust's Madeleine, which helps retrieve the past, Montale finds himself losing it, illustrating how time erases everything. The 'thread' also alludes to Ariadne's thread, symbolizing a guide out of a labyrinth, but Montale's thread is broken, and his memories are unreachable. The 'blackened weather vane' further emphasizes disorientation and the monotonous repetition of life's seasons. Montale's search for a 'breach' or a 'miracle' to escape existential imprisonment remains unfulfilled, as the waves continue to break, signifying an immobile and inescapable reality. Ultimately, the poet questions who is truly alive and who remains, feeling that those who stay are still prisoners of their existence.