Il mio pappagallo mutaforma
Il mio pappagallo mutaforma is a romance-erotic genre novel with fantasy elements, written by Teresa Bulgaro and first published in 1736 AN by the Vegnese publishing house Panduso Edizioni. The work marks the literary debut of the author, who has since established herself as one of the most original and recognizable voices in contemporary Vegno fiction. The novel is known for its ironic tone, surreal component and unconventional way in which it deals with the themes of identity, desire and metamorphosis.
Editions
The novel went through several reprints and revisions, contributing to its growing popularity in the years following publication:
- First edition (1736 AN) - Panduso Edizioni. Hardcover, with cover illustration by artist Foorreelangelo.
- Second illustrated edition (1739 AN) - Panduso Edizioni. Includes interior drawings in naturalistic style and an unpublished preface by the author. Reprint expanded and aimed at a wider audience.
Plot
Act I - The cartographer and the exotic bird
Lissara lives and works in Telveran, a coastal town overlooking the Sea of Vetaria, known for its vertical vegetation, steamy canals, and the Market of Unquiet Voices, a place where objects of uncertain powers and semi-magical creatures are traded. Orphaned by her mother and with an absent father, Lissara grew up under the loving but strict tutelage of Mael Cortivar, cartographer of the Reverse Routes Guild, who taught her to read the world as an overlay of symbols, geography and stories.
At twenty-seven, Lissara lives alone in a dilapidated turret in the Grey Bastion district, which she restored herself. By day she draws maps for merchants and shippers, while at night she composes alternative atlases based on urban legends and forgotten tales. She is an intelligent, reserved woman, obsessed with the idea that every shape can hide another. On a foggy morning, she buys an iridescent blue parrot at the market from a vendor who introduces himself as “Uldran, echo merchant.” The bird has no name and is initially silent, but that evening it begins to utter phrases not heard before, some of which accurately reproduce geographical concepts from Lissara's private diaries. Among them is an eerie fragment:
Mountains are just waves that have chosen to stand still.
Over the next few days, the parrot becomes more and more a part of Lissara's daily life. He never eats the same thing twice, shuns mirrors, and enjoys unraveling maps, artfully redrawing them with his beak or tearing them into shapes that look like seals. Despite her initial annoyance, Lissara takes a liking to the animal, whom she calls Ede, a diminutive she explains is derived from “Edessa”, the ancient word for “shifting boundary”. One night, while working on a map of the northern coastline, Lissara falls asleep at her desk. In the dream, she is in a sunken library, and a man with dark blue hair and yellow eyes hands her a living atlas. Upon awakening, she discovers that one of the maps has been altered with details she does not remember tracing: an island called Aelverin, which does not appear in any official documents. Tensions mount: the parrot begins to speak coherently, to ask questions, and finally reveals herself capable of writing- scratching symbols on a stone slab used to press the maps. Lissara alternates between moments of fascination and disquiet. The city itself seems to react: collective dreams begin to spread among the neighborhood residents, all containing a blue parrot or a male figure with iridescent features. Meanwhile, the Order of the Silent, a semi-religious group that oversees the balance between the physical world and shape-shifting spirits, begins to show interest in the protagonist's activities. One of its members, Serina Vellorn, apparently a spice merchant, discreetly tries to approach her. The first act closes with a thunderstorm hitting Telveran. During the night, Lissara watches the parrot dissolve into liquid light and reform, for an instant, into a naked man sitting on his work table. He does not utter words, but looks at her with a gaze that mixes fear, shame, and relief. Then he vanishes.
Act II - The Revelation and Transformation
After the first manifestation of Ede's human form, Lissara finds herself living in a state of emotional and rational alertness. She begins to suspend official duties for the Guild, taking refuge in her own tower, where the nocturnal appearances of the parrot-man become more frequent but never complete: Ede appears only for brief moments, dissolving with the dawn. Communication between them evolves, weaving words, shared dreams and symbols traced on the walls. Ede finally appears with his full name: Edevar, and reveals part of his origin. He is a shape-shifter from Larthend, a minor kingdom in the Seven Forests of Mornèa, condemned centuries earlier by a Reverse Time enchanter, Antherin Duvell, for transgressing the bond between form and truth. The parrot is not just a body in prison: he is a filter, a willing sacrifice not to forget who he was. The curse binds him to maintain the avian form, with brief openings only in the presence of those who “see the maps inside things,” like Lissara. Lissara, torn between skepticism and fascination, decides to investigate the enchanter. Through the intercession of Serina Vellorn, she discovers an occult archive in the dungeons of the Abbey of the Glasses, where she exhumes a tome entitled “The Ars Figurandi: Geographies of the Possible,” signed by Antherin himself. The book speaks of solidified mental territories, inner landscapes that take real form when traced by hands capable of “understanding metamorphosis.” Thus a new understanding of cartography begins to emerge: not as a description of the world, but as a magical act. Meanwhile, the relationship between Lissara and Edevar intensifies. On nights when he manages to mutate into human form, the two experience a sensual complicity that verges on ecstasy, but is always incomplete. Edevar is tormented by guilt over his own fragmented nature and fears consuming Lissara's will. She, on the other hand, begins to feel an obsessive desire for the transformation: more for the revelation it represents than for the man. Telveran, meanwhile, responds to their connection. City maps begin to diverge: entire neighborhoods appear altered or duplicated. Cartographers speak in whispers of the “Curve of Living Error.” Pools of water form in squares where there are no fountains. Rumors chase each other about a “Black Cartographer” who traces official maps with dream ink. Lissara realizes that the world around her is being shaped by her obsession. One evening, after a failed attempt to free Edevar by drawing a mental map of his human form, the protagonist suffers a mental trauma: she loses the ability to distinguish written words from arcane symbols for a few hours. Serina, who at this point reveals her affiliation with the Order of the Silent, offers her one last chance: to travel to the Lake of Interrupted Mirrors, where according to ancient texts it is possible to face one's double form and rewrite the link between form and essence. Lissara accepts, despite the risk that the balance between her and Edevar will be broken forever. Taking with her an incomplete map of Aelverin, a feather donated by Edevar and a white parchment, she leaves Telveran under a shower of soft ash, drawn by her own mind in an involuntary last act.
Act III - Choices, Bonds and Ambiguities.
The journey to the Lake of Broken Mirrors proves arduous and dreamlike. There is no fixed route; Lissara must draw the path day by day, following clues hidden in the margins of the maps she created in her sleep. The city of Telveran slowly disappears behind her, replaced by a changing landscape: forests that turn into living libraries, hills made of unwritten volumes, and paths that respond to the traveler's deepest emotions. Along the way, Lissara begins to lose some certainties: the boundary between herself and the parrot thins. At certain moments she dreams of flying; at others, she feels feathers sprouting on her back as she wakes up. The psychic fusion with Edevar becomes more intense: he speaks to her through reflections, wind, footprints that appear on maps. However, his voice also changes: it becomes colder, less human, as if the human form is fading. Finally, she reaches the lake: an expanse of still water framed by obsidian rocks, reflecting not real bodies but only unspoken truths. There, Lissara confronts her Second Form: a self dressed in feathers, amber eyes, and the map of Aelverin tattooed on her skin. The confrontation is not violent, but mental. The Second Form asks her a single question:
«What do you desire: to know or to possess?»
Lissara then understands that every attempt to “save” Edevar was, at bottom, a desire to possess. He has tried to fix him in an understandable, readable, mapable form. But Edevar is not a man, nor an animal: he is a flux, a being destined to mutate, to escape rational grids. Like any true desire. At the end of the ritual, he has two options: draw Edevar in human form on the white parchment, fixing him forever, or leave it untouched, allowing him to return to wind and air, to mutability. Lissara chooses not to draw. When she returns to Telveran weeks later, the city is different. Or perhaps she sees it differently. No one seems to remember the parrot, but in the quietest alleys a familiar cry is sometimes heard, and traces of moving islands begin to appear, transparently, on the Guild's official maps, which no one can fix twice in the same place. Lissara returns to her tower, more alone but more whole. She resumes writing, drawing maps without scale, telling impossible stories. At night, she dreams of flights in the clouds, but when she wakes up she no longer feels the need to chase them.
The blue parrot never returned. Or he never left.
Main Characters
- Lissara: a young self-taught cartographer and the novel's protagonist. Curious, independent and sensitive, she embarks on a journey of inner discovery and questioning of her own limitations.
- Edevar: shape-shifting creature in the form of a blue parrot; in human form he is an enigmatic and sensual companion for Lissara. He oscillates between sensuality and mystery, embodying the theme of metamorphosis and unstable identity.
- Mael Cortivar: Lissara's mentor and senior cartographer, who introduces the protagonist to the world of maps and geographical knowledge. A father figure, he feels a mixture of affection and concern for her path.
- Serina Vellorn: refined spice merchant and friend of Lissara. She provides practical and emotional support to the protagonist and offers a critical look at the parrot's influence.
- Antherin Duvell: ancient enchanter connected to the origin of the spell that transformed Edevar. He appears in the form of memory or dream fragments, feeding the magical dimension of the narrative.
