Call Me By Your Name, Andre Aciman

*Spoiler Alert*

To analyze all of Andre Aciman’s Call Me by Your Name would take years, and test my own emotional endurance as I am still quite raw. Therefore, I will analyze the ending only (after all, as proven by the novel, one truly cannot go back in time). The reason Elio and Oliver's love affair ends after Oliver leaves for the states is because they burned too brightly- they're obsessive love could in no way exist in the real world. Such a flame only burned in the most perfect of conditions- in Italy, in the summer, in the 80s, in a beautiful villa complete with tennis court, balcony, and about the most romantic setting you'll ever see. They both said that they would write and call etc., but both knew their days were numbered and that this love could only exist in the present. Furthermore, the reason Oliver went on to marry a woman and have kids while Elio did not was because Oliver was chronically "okay" with everything. Although he exuded this larger than life facade, he was really a shy person (As Elio’s father said after he didn’t show up to dinner one night, much to Elio’s dismay). And the only way to understand the ending is to see Oliver for what he is- a beautiful but flawed human being. It is easy to think the same way Elio does, and think Oliver has no faults, but he too is human. And this realization may make the affair lose some of its magic, but his humanness is an unavoidable truth that is necessary to understanding why he does what he does. So, just as Oliver was okay with getting rejected on a date with Marzia’s sister, and okay with his work being criticized, he was okay with moving on and, in our opinion as romanticists and readers, settling for an average love and a "parallel life" as he calls it. How do we know it was an average love? One can never be sure, but how can anything hold a candle to that summer in Italy- a summer of youth and innocence and love in the most pure and powerful sense of the word.

It is frustrating and heartbreaking, that Oliver could move on. It's a betrayal of our trust. Some beg the question did Oliver really love Elio, or did he know all along this was his plan- a summer affair of storybook proportions which yields after 6 months to a life of practicality and a more traditional love? That all he ever intended was for something he can look back to every once and a while in the shower and grin stupidly to himself? I beg to differ. As Annella said, Oliver was more in love with Elio than Elio was with Oliver. This is hard for readers to believe because Elio represents all of us in our youth and inexperience: insecure, awkward, paling in comparison to someone who could be so "confident" with himself- but it is true. It is much like when Elio found out that someone as much of an enigma as Oliver chose him over beauties like Marzia’s sister. And this makes matters even more irritating. Oliver truly loves Elio- even after all these years (which one can see through the way he keeps tabs on him, keeps his memorabilia , talks to him with such pure sentiment and caring) but still did not choose him over a "parallel life". So, why was he okay with this choice, if it was so clear he got the raw end of the stick? Perhaps Oliver wasn't as confident with himself as he appeared- perhaps he could never live his life with a man as he would a woman (Elio could never have given him biological children). Yet that night in Rome he kissed him in front of onlookers, who he heard whispering about them, but didn't care. Was he only invincible in that summer, with Elio, in that love? It just seems illogical that one would choose a life of complacency over the one he could have had with Elio, for who tastes the stars and does not as for a refill? But as Elio said, "We saw the starts, he and I. And that only happens once". Elio also said "Bombs do not strike the same place twice". Perhaps what they had in Italy that summer simply could not be bottled up and moved to New York. Maybe the environment was crucial to their affair- their unreclaimable youth and virginity fueling the flame in a way that could never be fueled with adulthood. But when they meet again, twice, it is irrefutable that the imprint they had upon each other is still there. That they will never truly demagnetize. And that is all that there will ever be, a momentary rekindling of a flame whenever they meet again, even if decades later, triggered by the fact that they are both still "live wires" all this time later. And Elio, although heartbreaking and unconvinced himself, says this is enough.

Will Elio ever marry? He is 37 when we last check in with him. I can't help but think that Oliver was it for Elio. And it's sad to think that he found his one true love so early, and the rest of his life he is left marooned because of it. But isn't that true of love, that when a heart breaks it does not do so evenly? That there is always one person left more damaged than the other? While we will never know how much Oliver thinks about their affair, there is tangible proof that he has, at least to some degree, "moved on"- his wife, his kids. But Elio has none of that, and I don't believe he even wants it. He says he has had other lovers since, some who have even technically eclipsed Oliver, but it appears as though he doesn't want better, he cannot see better, because Oliver was beyond comparison. Imperfections and all, Oliver was his person. Mainly because he saw himself in Oliver, he was in Oliver, as Oliver was in him. Their names were synonymous. And yet they sailed right past each other, two ships in the night. Two candles that burned far too bright. And all they have to show is a post card, a mask, a couple of inside jokes, and a billowy shirt. Is this enough? No, but it has to be. It is an unfair and cruel joke, but maybe it is time seeking revenge- catching up with them after it had seemingly stood still for 6 months. Perhaps this is the price to pay for seeing the stars and, although it was a faulty deal, neither Elio nor Oliver would change it for a thing. Because to have felt it, even briefly and unfairly and tauntingly- to have felt it was magic.