City of the Mind by Penelope Lively, adapted for BBC Radio

 City of the Mind by Penelope Lively, adapted for BBC Radio

Matthew Halland is the hero of this interesting, meditative, thought provoking narrative, dramatized for BBC Radio.

The first line announces the main theme – the dimensions of our existence: breadth, width, depth and…time.

Jane is the daughter of the protagonist and she is the one who asks about time, first her mother, who is separated from her father, who says she does not know how to explain and then, when the hero hears that his ex-wife did not have an answer…he is sure to give one.

The stars are there and yet, they may be already gone, for it takes so many thousands of years for their light to reach us and, once it does, they may be already dead, vanished.

Jane has an accident and given that her father is not there – although he runs to the hospital as soon as he finds out – she is worried and concerned that he is not there…in general, inviting us to think.

A child can open up a discussion with deep impact, for she means that her father was not there when she broke her wrist, but he may cease to exist altogether when she is with her mother and her new partner- of course, Jane does not use these words.

Matthew has a new partner, but while they have sex, he does not shout her name and provokes her to explain to him…

-          Look, in the present there is me, Alice and for the past, there was Susan, the former Susan Halland

This woman is thirty-seven and given this delicate age, she is worried that she would not have the chance, the biology to have children for many years in the future and therefore she brings this up in a restaurant…

Look, at my age I have to consider a change

Yes, I thought we could not go on like this

I want you to give me a baby…

It was not in those words, but the hero was very surprised to hear the proposal and the insistence that if it is a question of money, they would have a contract and she says so loud that all the people inside could hear-

You mean you are infertile!?

While in a sandwich shop, a woman discovers she does not have her purse and Matthew offers to buy her the tuna sandwich she had wanted, which is only a little more than one pound.

The shop assistant is curious as to why he did not ask for the address, to get the money back supposedly and with hindsight, the hero leaves his card and says that if she should return, she could call him.

The architect meets a developer who has two mean dogs, a project for a new building that would interest the protagonist and a strange joke:

Shampoo?

I am sorry.

This is my little joke

Alas, the mirth is short lived – if there was any – and this vicious character has a murderous manner of convincing the tenants to evacuate premises for which he has other plans – reminding one of the superb French film The Beat That My Heart Skipped with the phenomenal Romain Duris, perhaps the best French star now.

One eight year old Bangladeshi girl is killed when thugs sent in by the mobster- property developer push a petrol bomb – most likely – in the premises and a fire is provoked that terrifies Matthew Halland when he learns about it.

He calls his supposed business partner and they have an argument, as expected, the hero is overwhelmed by the news that he had accepted to work for the plans for a building that has caused the death of a child.

Evidently, there was nothing he could have done about it.

In the meantime, the woman that had benefited from the gallantry, politeness of the protagonist has received his card, calls and says that she owes him lunch, where they agree from the very beginning.

She refers to this awkward way of meeting, but ads that the other methods of trying to find a partner as just as outré and Matthew agrees.

Whereas the first line mentions the four dimensions – length, breadth, depth and time- towards the end, Matthew Halland concludes that there is another dimension to consider along with the aforementioned and that is…

Love!