Have you ever dreamed of having a twin? What about a twin that was attached to your head while growing up in communist Yugoslavia? Dream no more, my friend! A Spare Life by Lidija Dimkovska is the emotional tale of Zlata and Srebra, twins conjoined at the head, struggling to find meaning and identity in the face overwhelming poverty, political instability, and an emotionally uncertainty. Heavy stuff, no doubt, A Spare Life presents a reality that is almost more terrifying than that in which we currently live.
Set in late 20th century Yugoslavia, Zlata and Srebra, twins conjoined just above the temple, live a solitary life. Different in every respect save their clothing and the ridicule they receive from their family and community, our young twins struggle to find a shared direction for their live. In fact, they don’t, but necessity forces acquiescence by one or the other, which only serves to heighten the conflict between two completely different identities.
Yes, they have a couple friends to soften the blow, but one dies and the other moves away and the girls are left alone to confront a mother that oscillates between depression and severe depression, social support system riddled with absenteeism and death, and a nation on the brink of collapse. They make it to university where one finds faith and the other love when they suddenly find themselves in a position to receive the operation they need to gain independence, hopefully acceptance. They proceed at great risk and pay handsomely for the life they so desire, but the perspective the experience engenders pays out when they find peace in the life they fought so hard to escape.
Lidija Dimkovska, born in raised in Skopje, Macadonia, Home of Zlata and Srebra, does a wonderful job capturing the angst, tragedy, and terror of adolescence against a zeitgeist of social, cultural, and political upheaval. The girl’s awareness starts simply,
“At such moments, she hated me more than anything in the world. I hated her too because I felt she hated me.”
But, it evolves with the oscillation of emotion and time to inspire a level of awareness that I couldn’t fathom well into my thirties.
“Collective tragedies and the tragedies of the collective, no matter how intense, cannot surpass individual tragedy.”
Finally maturing into a world-view that is both dire and inspired.
“[We]…had been separated so that we would no longer be ‘invalids’, so that we would no longer have a ‘physical defect’, but now, with my body alone in the universe…I was truly an invalid.”
There are couple minor annoyances, descriptive phrases repeated verbatim throughout the text, but those instances are insignificant against the weight of Lidija Dimkovska’s words. Oh, and free up a few weeks because. Weighing in at a hefty 500+ pages, A Spare Life does require a good deal of attention. No matter, it’s complexity and precision make avoiding the tragedy of my middle-class, industrialised life enjoyable.
Some of the coverage you find on Cultured Vultures contains affiliate links, which provide us with small commissions based on purchases made from visiting our site. We cover gaming news, movie reviews, wrestling and much more.
