Rec | GIOVANNI’S ROOM

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One of my all time favorite books and I would sell my kidneys to read it for the first time. “Do you think anything else under heaven really matters? And how long, at the best, can it last? since you are both men and still have everywhere to go? Only five minutes, I assure you, only five minutes, and most of that, hélas! in the dark. And if you think of them as dirty, then they will be dirty—they will be dirty because you will be giving nothing, you will be despising your flesh and his. But you can make your time together anything but dirty; you can give each other something which will make both of you better—forever—if you will not be ashamed, if you will only not play it safe.” He paused, watching me, and then looked down to his cognac. “You play it safe long enough,” he said, in a different tone, “and you’ll end up trapped in your own dirty body, forever and forever and forever—like me.” I cried for 2 days straight after reading this.. TWO DAYS!! My favorite excerpt from the entire book. James Baldwin is a genius and may his heavenly soul rest in peace.

@piscesprincess07

May 12, 2025

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Giovanni’s Room - james baldwin

Lyrical and tender, this is a short book but you’ll want to read it slowly simply because every page is packed with something devastating or gorgeous...or both “For I am—or I was—one of those people who pride themselves on their willpower, on their ability to make a decision and carry it through. This virtue, like most virtues, is ambiguity itself. People who believe that they are strong-willed and the masters of their destiny can only continue to believe this by becoming specialists in self-deception. Their decisions are not really decisions at all—a real decision makes one humble, one knows that it is at the mercy of more things than can be named—but elaborate systems of evasion, of illusion, designed to make themselves and the world appear to be what they and the world are not.”

@isthefruitstillgood

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Giovanni‘s room by james baldwin

Short and enthralling, with prose that is both breezy and profound and a simple yet confounding story. It’s like a snapshot of someone’s heart. I think the scenery and emotion of this book brought about a natural and gorgeous visualization of the story, which is wonderful to experience.