It’s never easy to find the place in life that feels right, but if we do, it’s like heaven. Some people, however, lack the courage and/or the stamina to reach for the stars and to truly live their potential. They content themselves with playing a minor part in the play of life, often one that is less exciting, less satisfying and less respectable, but at the same time safer. The reasons for it may be manifold although often they have to do with previous – usually childhood – experiences that undermined self-esteem and self-confidence. And it shouldn’t be underestimated how strong the social pressure to follow in the footsteps of the ancestors and not to cross class limits can be even today. The Elegance of the Hedgehog by Muriel Barbery as my latest bookish déjà-vu shows a lower-class concierge in her fifties and a bourgeois teenager learning to show their true selves.
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