By Ben Andoni
It seems almost impossible—or at least strange—that in this era of immense cybernetic development, one could still feel alone. Even more surprising is that this feeling persists amid the frenzied lifestyles of so many public figures and the endless array of television programs that keep the eyes of Albanian citizens glued to their screens. In truth, loneliness has engulfed all layers of society. Beyond the elderly—where, sadly, solitude has become an entrenched norm—it now extends across every corner of social life. Except for a small circle of the dazzlingly luxurious elite and the human networks feeding from the veins of power, Albanians feel profoundly alone. You sense it in the rare moments of sincere conversation, in the topics people choose to discuss, and above all, in the disappearance of hope.
We have built a state that, in so many ways, does not respond to us; we face the frightening arrogance of the administration and the “Rama” Executive; a local government that, in most cities, acts more as a passive observer than a helper or facilitator; and we drift chaotically amid an international climate where the breath of war feels ever closer.
The Invention of Solitude as a concept belongs to the renowned American writer Paul Auster, who penned a novel by the same title in 1982—at a time when he was just beginning to reveal not only his literary talent but also a deep artistic perception and vast philosophical insight. Known in its original form as The Invention of Solitude, the book—still freely available to readers today—captures not merely the story of absence or disconnection, but the realization that solitude itself is a form of power, one that profoundly shapes human life.
If we look back only a few decades—to the socialist regime that still lingers in our memory—we find that those reflections do not seem far removed in time, yet they feel as though from another era. They begin mainly in the early 1990s, when we once again began the cycle of rebuilding our state from scratch, burdened by the same flaws and, in many cases, even deeper ones than before. There was faith in renewal: in a Democratic Party that promised transformation, a rebranded monarchy, and the Republican Party with its promise of space and balance. New parties sprouted like mushrooms, but they all taught Albanians a bitter truth—that the destiny of some nations seems predetermined. However much one may try to clothe that destiny in metaphysics or fatalism, it remains loyal to its roots. Ours, undeniably, is such a case.
Not even in the wildest dreams of the 1980s could one have imagined that Kosovo would one day have its own state, or that Albania would become a society where a market economy and pluralist elections were the norm. Yet, only a few years later, our so-called democratic system revealed that the real deviation lay not in the form of governance but within ourselves—deep in our collective absurdity. Injustice became normality; the strong claimed the right to dominate urban space and to speak of their victims as if they were mere vegetables in Arturo Ui’s market. The recent criminal wiretaps from Durrës confirm this beyond doubt. Nobodies are catapulted into millionaires through proximity to power, while politicians lose all sense of reality.
Prime Minister Rama, through his daily appearances and his hybrid “war on informality,” has shown how dire the country’s condition truly is under his structures. He has also exposed his profound ignorance of Albania’s reality down to its smallest cell. After three mandates, Rama still speaks of things that should long ago have been a given: clean drinking water, public transport, intercity infrastructure, building permits, public beaches, the protection of natural reserves—a mountain of normalities that should no longer need to be mentioned (!).
This has rendered today’s Albanian silent—consumed by absolute solitude. This last concept, perhaps one of the most complex and multifaceted of all, can be interpreted in many ways. Yet, at its core, solitude is tied to subjective experience—defined by psychologists and sociologists as isolation, detachment from society, and melancholy. Indeed, the modern Albanian is often alone—perhaps even more so when surrounded by crowds, swallowed by the noise and frenzy of mass life; unheard by his own government, which still fails to meet even basic needs (despite Albania’s 44,000 square kilometers of water basins); besieged by crime, whose tentacles have reached into power; and suffocated by a low-tier bureaucracy and the absence of proper services. In the end, he is alienated even from himself.
Our community has gone deaf before the absurdity of a social order where people obsess over show business, and at funerals, instead of mourning the dead, they gossip over couples’ photos. Today’s Albanian no longer finds solace even in memory, for memories themselves seem worthless unless made “clickable” in this society of display. Thus, increasingly, the Albanian begins to doubt even his own self.
We now collect the experiences of this solitude—an accumulation of sorrowful episodes that have turned into collective trauma. Social trauma, professional trauma, the deep wounds of dignity—all these feed the solitude. They are the only window through which the Albanian individual can look out and see that his fate is not his alone, that others share his pain—yet still, there is no comfort, for he remains alone in his experience.
And the shocks keep coming, in the form of bitter truths that remind us: the loss of hope in this country has become the new normal. “Memory,” writes Auster in The Invention of Solitude, “is not merely the resurrection of one’s private past, but a descent into the past of others—into history itself, of which you are a part and witness.”
The Invention of Solitude in Albania thus becomes a chronicle of the citizen’s trauma—woven with the pain of everyone else—and the startling recognition of another’s wound in a society where only failures are measured. Through memory and reality alike, we are alone in this solitude.
We have it.
We must reinvent it.
To survive.
(Homo Albanicus)