Superiority in The Siren

“I think he must have acquired a certain affection for me too, but I am under no illusions about that; if he did have any , it was not what one of “us people” ( to use the Senator’s term) might feel for a human being, but more like an old spinster’s affection for her pet canary, of whose fatuity and incomprehension she is aware but whose existence permits her to express aloud regrets in which the little creature has no part; on the other hand, if it were not there, she would feel ill-at-ease. I began noticing, in fact, that whenever I was late the old man’s haughty eyes were fixed on the entrance door” (pg 66).

In The Siren, Paolo Corbera meets an aged Sicilian Senator named Rosario la Ciura. Paolo and Rosario, acquainted through their Sicilian nationality, begin to meet on a nightly basis in a cafe that Rosario describes as a “ghost-filled...geometric site of failed people” (pg 67). Rosario’s list of accomplishments ranged from being a published author, to being the Chair of Greek Literature at two different universities. Paolo, being a little-known law school graduate turned editorial office employee, poses a small amount of worthiness to Rosario, for he resembled one of the "failed people" that he so eloquently described as belonging to the cafe. Utilizing what he already knows about Paolo, Rosario manipulates situations within their interactions to establish himself as an intellectual, cultural, and experiential superior to Paolo.