- Aug 2024
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However,they are both skirting around the ambivalence of language to commu-nicate,
Adds depth to my argument surrounding words as deception, as although the unstable meaning of words can detract from the truthfulness of expression of desire and therefore, identity, the ambiguity of words can also play for time and serve, here, as a secret space of understanding, perhaps because both Oliver and Elio are queer, but maybe also because they desire one another and to have is to be? No clue
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The novel, in its very premise introduces us to the idea of sub-jectivity in ‘meaning.’
Yes, exactly! This connects to the duplicity and deception in words
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The quotation of Elio’s language usage here—as well as the repetition, inversion, and changes inemphasis—places focus structurally on the actual words to represent the implications of thisutterance (the implications being that Elio desires Oliver).
I guess the fact that the meaning of the repetition in words can so obviously shift and is unstable can also represent the instability of the identity and the contradictions that can occur even when the same body (or words) is being expressed.
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researchportal.hkr.se researchportal.hkr.se
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Oliver knows that speaking things aloud makes themreal and definitive
Speech makes things real and definitive
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wanted his tongue inmy mouth and mine in his—because all we had become, after all theseweeks and all the strife and all the fits and starts that ushered a chill drafteach time, was just two wet tongues flailing away in each other’s mouths
All the misunderstandings lead to simply the physicality and exchange of identity of two wet tongues, while words deceived them all
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“Going on?” I fumbled by way of a question. “Nothing.” I thoughtabout it some more. “Nothing,” I repeated, as if what I was vaguelybeginning to get a hint of was so amorphous that it could just as easily beshoved away by my repeated “nothing” and thereby fill the unbearable gapsof silence. “Nothing.”
The irony of repeating "nothing" and yet a growing sense of amorphous insight. This demonstrates the deception of words well, and yet shows that understanding is often pushed away and manipulated by words
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Now, in the silence of the moment, I stared back, not to defy him,or to show I wasn’t shy any longer, but to surrender, to tell him this is who Iam, this is who you are, this is what I want, there is nothing but truthbetween us now, and where there’s truth there are no barriers,
Silence and yet at the same time communication
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“I’m not wise at all. I told you, I know nothing. I know books, and Iknow how to string words together—it doesn’t mean I know how to speakabout the things that matter most to me.”
Deception of words
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“What things that matter?”Was he being disingenuous?“You know what things. By now you of all people should know.”Silence.“Why are you telling me all this?”“Because I thought you should know.”“Because you thought I should know.” He repeated my words slowly,trying to take in their full meaning, all the while sorting them out,
No explicit conversation here, just fuddling, yet the meaning is conveyed perfectly and they share it with a kiss.
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This was probably the firsttime in my life that I spoke to an adult without planning some of what I wasgoing to say. I was too nervous to plan anything
His bodily reaction prevents him from planning, from taking the spontaneity and truthfulness of his expression out. His body cannot lie, it is representative of his identity and overcomes the deception of words.
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- Jul 2024
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Oliver’s response “hated it?” turns Elio’sstatement into a question, just as Echo turns Narcissus’ question into a statement: dixerat “ecquisadest?” et “adest!” responderat Echo (“He had said, ‘Is anyone here?’ and ‘She is here!’ Echohad responded,” Ov. Met. 6.379)
Does this show how meaning in words can be twisted into several other variations, and therefore how speaking can be of deception, while bodily expression is most honest of the identity? And then how do we connect bodily continuity/expression to identity holding contradictions?
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ndeed, Elio later emphasizes his fear ofspeaking when he likens himself to a knight in a novella he is reading who cannot decidewhether it is better “to speak or to die” in order to resolve his concealed love for a princess(Aciman 2007: 63). We later learn that the knight does decide to speak, but “fudges” and doesnot say everything that he wants to say (Aciman 2007: 68)
What do words signify in CMBYN? We know both that Elio has a "fear" of speaking, but how does speaking show deception, and why is that important in identity?
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I would have blushed, and blushed because I had blushed, fuddledwith words and ultimately broken down—and then where would I be? Whatwould he say?Better break down now, I thought, than live another day juggling all ofmy implausible resolutions to try again later
Shows that true identity is most transparent (Cor cordium; heart of hearts) through the expression of the body. The body never lies. The blushing and the fuddling would have given it all, and therefore is the basis of bodily continuity
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Speechless,I would have admitted things I hadn’t mapped out for myself or didn’tknow I had it in me to admit. Speechless, I would have gotten to where mybody longed to go far sooner than with any bon mot prepared hours aheadof time.
Elio's comment on the use of words to express oneself, on defining (unnecessarily) identity that confound and bring oneself FURTHER from truth, than if he stayed silent and speechless, through which more could be conveyed than with any fancy expressions said verbally
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- May 2024
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I asked, “Must we?” This was theclosest I would ever come to saying, Stay. Just stay with me. Let your handtravel wherever it wishes, take my suit off, take me, I won’t make a noise,won’t tell a soul, I’m hard and you know it, and if you won’t, I’ll take thathand of yours and slip it into my suit now and let you put as many fingersas you want inside me
Later in the novel it shows that he does pick up on this. This shows support of body language, the deception of words and yet the honesty of bodily expression. True identity comes through in skin.
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