How to Be Both

How to be Both is a 2014 novel by Scottish author Ali Smith. The narrative explores common threads of grief, identity, and memory from the perspectives of recently bereaved 16-year-old English schoolgirl George and a character named Francescho, inspired by the real 15th-century Italian artist Francesco del Cossa. The book, exploring themes such as The Impact of Grief on Personality, Ambiguity as an Inescapable Feature of Life, and Everyday Resistance to Injustice, was a critical success, winning numerous prestigious literary awards and receiving largely positive reviews. 

Each edition of the book was published simultaneously in two versions; one with the part “Camera” preceding the part “Eyes,” and the other with “Eyes” preceding “Camera.” The book can be read in either order, allowing for two very different reading experiences. This guide uses the 2015 Penguin Books paperback edition with “Camera” as Part 1 and “Eyes” as Part 2.

Content Warning: The source material and guide feature depictions and discussions of death, gender discrimination, sexual content, and graphic violence.

Language Note: This guide uses he/him pronouns in most cases to refer to the character Francesco. While Francesco inhabits a different gender identity than the one assigned to him at birth, he is not necessarily a transgender man in the modern sense. In childhood, this character accepts her father’s suggestion to adopt a male identity in order to get an apprenticeship as an artist. Prior to this decision, she does not experience gender dysphoria or otherwise question her identity as a girl. For this reason, the guide will refer to the young Francesco (not yet her name, though her birth name is not specified) using she/her pronouns. Additionally, the spelling “Francescho” is used in the section from his own perspective (Part 2: “Eyes”), while “Francesco” is used in the section from George's perspective (Part 1: “Camera”) when referring to the true historical figure, Francesco del Cossa.

Plot Summary

The main body of the novel consists of two parts, each subdivided into three chapters. Part 1 in this version of the text is “Camera,” and focuses on the experience of George, a 16-year-old English schoolgirl grappling with the recent death of her mother. This part is written in a third-person limited perspective that reflects George’s point of view and experience.

George passes the first New Years Eve since her mother’s death at home. She makes plans to begin each day in the new year by dancing the twist in honor of her mother and then watching a pornographic video to bear witness to the exploitation of the young woman it depicts. George offers comfort to her younger brother Henry and is visited by a classmate, H, who previously destroyed another girl’s phone to defend George from harassment. Throughout the night, George recalls memories of time spent with her mother, particularly a recent trip to Italy to see the artwork of Francesco del Cossa in Palazzo Schifanoia.

George and H spend an evening playing in a local multi-story carpark together. They work together on a school project and revision, and George shows H her mother’s office. George’s mother was an online activist who created anti-government Subvert popups online, and prior to her death, George’s mother told her that she believed she was under surveillance. George recalls that her mother developed a deep and quasi-romantic friendship with a woman named Lisa Goliard, only to cut off contact when she became suspicious that Lisa was spying on her for the government. H validates George’s suspicions and confesses her romantic feelings for George, although George is uncertain whether she reciprocates H’s interest. George continues to meet with the school guidance counselor, who is tasked with helping her through her grief, although George sees little value in the sessions. H admits that her family will soon be moving away to Denmark, although she promises to keep in touch with George.

After H moves away, George and H stay in touch through texts and emails, and George realizes that she reciprocates H’s romantic feelings. George confesses to her father that there’s a leak in her bedroom ceiling and opens up to the school guidance counselor, showing that she is beginning to work through her grief and alienation. George regularly skips school to spend hours in an art gallery looking at a painting of Saint Vincent de Ferra by Italian Renaissance painter Francesco del Cossa. The more time she spends looking at the piece, the more she likes and admires it. George sees Lisa Goliard come to the gallery to look at the painting, confirming in George’s mind that Lisa was indeed monitoring her mother for the government, and that she may well have inadvertently fallen in love with her target. George secretly follows Lisa from the gallery to her home.

Part 2, “Eyes,” is written from the first-person perspective of a character called Francescho, based on Francesco del Cossa, the painter whose work George admires in “Camera.” Francescho exists in an insubstantial state of “purgatorium” tied to George, only able to observe the modern world and work through memories of his life.

Francescho regains consciousness and realizes that he is a spirit unable to communicate with anyone in the unfamiliar modern world, which he believes to be a kind of purgatory. He is tied to George, whom he mistakes for a boy, first as she stares at Francescho’s painting and then as she follows Lisa Goliard to her home and takes photographs of her house. Francescho recalls some memories from his life, including his mother’s death when he was young, the decision to live as a man in order to study and work as a painter, and meeting his best friend Barto for the first time.

Francescho watches as George continues to stalk Lisa Goliard. He recalls the time that Barto took him to see a parade celebrating the Duke Borso d’Este, who would go on to commission the fresco in Piazza Schifanoia. The Duke styles himself as modest, just, and generous, but he refuses to increase the pitiful wages of the painters he employs, despite their repeated appeals and the high quality of Francescho’s work. In his youth, Francescho used to visit a brothel with Barto. There, he would exchange sketches of the women for money and later for lessons in pleasuring a woman. When Barto learns that Francescho has female genitalia, his impossible love for Francescho sees him breaking the friendship, although they soon reconcile.

Francescho begins work on a large-scale fresco at the Piazza Schifanoia, commissioned by Duke Borso d’Este. He works closely with a young apprentice named Ercole, teaching him a great deal about painting techniques and allowing him to work on some of the less important scenes. Francescho work challenges convention, especially in his inclusion of a Black fieldworker as a symbol of strength and virtue. Francescho objects to being paid the same rate as the other artists employed on the fresco, given that his work is clearly superior. When the artists collectively demand a pay raise, Francescho refuses to sign on. Ercole forges his signature, leading to a falling out between master and apprentice. When the Duke refuses to pay Francescho what Francescho believes he is worth, Francescho adds a critical image of the Duke into the scene.

A year after the fresco at Piazza Schifanoia is completed, Ercole reports to Francescho that his work has become famous among the local populace. Workers flock to his scene to feel vindication for the Duke’s cruelty, and Black fieldworkers are entranced by the representation of one of their own in a work of public art. Francescho recalls the sorrow he felt at his father’s death, which imbued his paintings with bitterness. Barto helped to draw him out of his misery through a farcical ritual, during which Francescho briefly convinced him that he’d lost all of his memories. As he watches George assemble her photographs of Lisa Goliard’s house into a collage and reconnect with a visiting H, Francescho finally remembers his own death. He caught the black plague and died under the dedicated and tender care of Ercole. Francescho slowly fades from consciousness as he watches H and George paint eyes on the brick wall opposite Lisa’s house.