Captain Corelli’s Mandolin: Chapter 23 Summary & Analysis

On the day of the Italian invasion, the Cephalonians know the worst is coming. Kokolios and Stamatis clean a hunting rifle together, at last putting aside their ideological differences. Men expect to be beaten and young women expect to be raped. Father Arsenios finds his usual prayers aren't comforting. He asks God what he thinks he's doing and promises that if God won't help, he will. Dr. Iannis cuts an open letter to Hitler out of the paper and tacks it to the wall, like every other literate man in Greece.

Dr. Iannis turns to his history of Cephalonia and writes about how the Cephalonians have a habit of comparing their many invaders to the horrendous Turks--who, on later reflection, weren't that bad. The British weren't that bad either; they were consistently awful but then made up for it later. He writes that he hopes the British will sweep in and save them this time, even if they've abandoned them now. When Dr. Iannis finishes, he boxes up his history and hides it in the trapdoor in the floor.

At Drosoula's house, Pelagia sits shamefully with Mandras. She believes he's torturing her deliberately, as he spent days rigid and drooling, got up to celebrate a holiday, and then returned to bed, limp and yet able to resist being fed. Mandras asked for Father Arsenios and confessed that he had sex with the queen and that his legs were made of glass. Father Arsenios suggested they send him to the madhouse. Two days later Mandras tried to amputate his leg with a spoon and finally, on April 30th, asked Pelagia to read him her letters.

Pelagia begins with the first letters and is privately aghast at them. Mandras glares at her whenever she pauses. As she reaches the letters where she begins to reprimand him for not writing, he throws a fit about not wanting to hear about how he disappointed everyone--but when she simply omits those parts, he complains the letters are too short. He angrily waves the last four-line letter at her. It reads that she's calling off their engagement, but she lies and tells him that it asks him to come back soon. He forces her to read the others and she makes up romantic things instead of reading her unhappy letters.

Finally, Pelagia hears planes overhead and races outside. She watches Italian soldiers parachute down and then runs to Dr. Iannis. He remarks that they're in the middle of history and fetches a pencil and notebook. Slowly, the Italian soldiers begin to march through town, some waving to the Greeks and others making fun of Hitler. Kokolios raises a communist salute and is flabbergasted when soldiers return it. When an officer asks Dr. Iannis where Lixouri is, Dr. Iannis says in Italian that he doesn't speak Italian. A column led by Captain Antonio Corelli marches past and makes funny faces at Pelagia. She laughs, but Dr. Iannis tells her it's her duty to hate them.