Clementius Stupnagel di Montefalcone: the saga of a smart artist (smartast)

Chapter 5
Although neither she (CSM's mother) nor her husband were jewish, she decided to send her son to the B’nai Haftorah Yeshiva in Brooklyn, which had a reputation of being one of the best schools in the Flatbush area. CSM had trouble learning Hebrew, all the more so that in the meantime, his father had returned and spoke nothing but italian, a language unfamiliar to CSM and to CSM’s mother. CSM thus became dyslexic and was thrown out of the Yeshiva, especially after the rumor went around about the love affair CSM’s father had had with the Duce.
Public schools in New York were full of immigrant children after the war, most of whom did not speak English, and so they were not willing to cope with dyslexic children too. This forced CSM’s mother to place her child in a private school, The New School in Manhattan, recommended by the Grosshandels. Being near pennyless, Stupnagel and di Montefalcone requested a scholarship for their son, which was granted on the grounds that CSM was a gifted, although dyslexic, child (information conveyed by the Grosshandels). The problem was that Stupnagel, di Montefalcone and son lived in Brooklyn and the school was in Manhattan, so that at a very early age CSM was forced to travel in the subway.

Clementius Stupnagel di Montefalcone: the saga of a smart artist (smartast)

Chapter 4
Inspite of the frequent change of domicile, CSM’s first few years of life were quite pleasant, being that he was in a cocoon. But as CSM’s mother had to work, and having no family to help her, she first put CSM in a municipal day camp on Coney Island and then in a kindergarten (the Grosshandel Kindergarten) in Queens. At the day camp, CSM made his first drawing that unsurprisingly ressembled a swan.

It was at the kindergarten that he made his second drawing, which was by no means remarkable, but that his mother took for a portrayal of his absent father. The Grosshandel’s, who had training in Gestalttheorie, saw more in this drawing than a vulgar portrait, be it that of CSM’s (absent) father or of someone else. In fact, their idea was that it was an expressionist representation of Kierkegaard’s hamster, you know, the animal that Kierkegaard’s writes about on and on for hundreds of pages.

The Grosshandel’s would have liked to keep CSM in their kindergarten until High school, but CSM’s mother had other plans, namely after the return of the father of her son.

Clementius Stupnagel di Montefalcone: the saga of a smart artist (smartast)

Chapter 3
He (Mr. Stupnagel) was a very stern man and beat up both his daughter and wife very frequently. One day, CSM’s austrian grandmother, didn’t wake up after a severe beating, so CSM’s mother left for America. She was young when she arrived there and met CSM’s father on Ellis Island. Since he was already pennyless, he advised her to work, which she did first as a maid, then as a factory worker (for some company manufacturing bombs for the war effort). After the Dresden bombing, the plant shut down and she was laid off. Without the resources procured by his companion’s work, CSM’s father became distraught, and to show it, had intercourse with CSM’s mother. That was how she wound up being pregnant while tending a merry-go-round on Coney Island.

Clementius Stupnagel di Montefalcone: the saga of a smart artist (smartast)

Chapter 2
CSM’s father was not present at his mariage nor at the birth of his son. The reason for this is that he wasn’t in Coney Island, but somewhere in Italy. The di Montefalcone’s were an old banking family, apparently since the times of the Etruscan invasion. CSM’s father had a love affaire with Mussolini and went back to the home town (Poggibonsi) of his ancestors as soon as the Duce granted Italian citizenship to all those who emigrated to America and wanted back.
Then, perhaps because of the war, track was lost of this man until he resurfaced in 1946, as pennyless as before. In the meantime, CSM’s mother moved from Coney Island to Queens, and then to the Bronx, near Van Cortland Park.
Her appartment in the Bronx was too small to house CSM’s father too so they all moved to Brooklyn, in a small house on a side street off Flatbush avenue. CSM resented the intrusion of his father into the cocoon his mother had built around himself. Mrs. di Montefalcone née Stupnagnel was a quite religious (catholic) character of Austrian descent. She was born and brought up in Klagenfurt where her father made wooden skis.

Clementius Stupnagel di Montefalcone: the saga of a smart artist (smartast)

Chapter 1
Clementius (named after a 9th century pope) Stupnagel di Montefalcone (CSM) was born on the Cyclone roller coaster in Coney Island, N.Y. on an undetermined date shortly after the beginning of World War II (this enabled him to escape the draft). CSM’s mother tended a merry-go-round at the Coney Island amusement park and one day, for no reason at all, let the kids have a few free turns while she hopped onto the roller coaster. The sensations this procured made her give birth to CSM at the middle of the first fast descent. At the end of the ride, she cut the umbilical cord, returned to her merry-go-round and put CSM in a swan. For the remainder of the day, the swan and CSM turned round and round on the merry-go-round.