I used to think that the choice in love had only two answers — to love or not to love. After reading Giovanni’s Room, I realized there is a more torturous option: “I love it, but I dare not take it.”
The protagonist of this book, David, wavers between two lovers. One is Hella, his fiancée waiting for him in Paris. The other is Giovanni, an Italian bartender.
But what truly tore him apart was never two people. It was two selves. One was the respectable man he wanted to become — upright, reliable, walking in the sunlight. The other was who he really was — passionate, timid, at a loss. He wanted both. He could master neither.
The Two Lives David Cannot Reconcile
David is the narrator of the novel — a young American wandering in Paris. He has a fiancée named Hella, blonde, blue-eyed, with a lovely smile. He loves her too. That kind of love is secure and respectable, something everyone can bless. Giovanni is an Italian bartender he met at a gay bar. Dark-skinned, with fire in his eyes. When David is with Giovanni, he becomes like a different person.
Baldwin writes David’s struggle like an underwater fight for survival. The self beside Hella is the person he wants to become — upright and reliable. The self beside Giovanni is who he really is — passionate and timid. He doesn’t know which one is the real him.
There is one sentence in the book that I read several times. Baldwin wrote:
“I convinced myself that as long as I didn’t say it out loud, it didn’t exist.”
David is not a bad person. He is just too afraid. So afraid that he swallows his true feelings and lets them rot inside and lets them rot there slowly.
An Island, Also a Prison
Giovanni’s room is more of a condition than a place. It is narrow and messy, cluttered with things, unwashed cups in the corner, the bedsheets always wrinkled. But inside this room, David does not have to explain who he is.
When he lies on that bed with Giovanni, all the outside labels — morality, fear, other people’s judgments — are blocked out by that thin door. This room is an island in the Parisian night.
But this room is also a prison. David can only be himself when the door is closed. He dare not open that door. He dare not take Giovanni outside. Every time Giovanni asks him about the future, David dodges the question in that infuriatingly evasive way. The promise he makes to Giovanni never extends beyond “tonight.”
I watched a man fall repeatedly between running from himself and returning to himself. Each fall left another bruise.
Baldwin’s Pen is Like a Knife Made of Ice
Baldwin’s writing is cold. He writes passion without sentimentality. He writes despair without crying out in pain. With that bone-chilling tone, he tells you that this person is trembling, that person is lying, and eventually, all of it collapses into a simple sentence: “I have to go.”: “I have to go.”
But some things, if not coated in ice, would burn you the moment they were spoken.
In the end, Giovanni’s room is empty. Giovanni is dead. Hella has left. David stands alone on the streets of Paris, facing countless paths, each one leading to a version of himself he can never return to.After reading this book, you will not feel relieved. It will make you think, for a long time, about that sentence. Only you know whether you said it out loud or not. But in your heart, you know it exists. It has always been there.
