(KC, I'll try not to call her Miranda, the new name I gave her post-Tom's "Botticelli" reference.)
At times Tom called Alice the love of his life, but he suggested that he never thought of her as more than a beautiful woman to observe until Moon inquired how they were getting on. Did you have any trouble visualizing or understanding this relationship?
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It felt more like a crush to me than the love of one's life. And the fact, as you mention, that he didn't seem to think of her as more than something pretty to look at before Moon made that suggestion, well, that just made it seem all the more nebulous and adolescent (like "hey, you should try to get with her. I think she's into you!")
ReplyDeleteThe book is kind of a memoir. It's clear that it's written a long time after the events described. Tom says, "Ah those days ... for many years afterward their happiness haunted me." And he talks about the importance of "snatching" at happiness before it flies. So maybe there's an element of regret in his remembrance of joy. Or maybe looking back on all the women he's encountered, that month long ago with her stands out as simply the most romantic — hence "love of my life." Maybe the fact that the relationship never became consummated and real and complicated makes him idealize it in the way that men — especially ones who've had lady troubles — are wont to do.
I like that take on it, kc. The whole story seemed a little like a romanticized memory, and the relationship with Alice would likely be the most romanticized.
ReplyDeleteGreat point. Maybe the "road not taken" aspect to it is what makes it so special. I can see feeling that way.
ReplyDeleteI wonder whether he chose not to consummate the relationship (or not-relationship) because at the time it didn't have that pull that he gave it in retrospect (as in, in the present it seemed to messy to initiate) or if there were some hurt feelings/memories of Vinny that drove him to decide to stay faithful, despite no apparent reward for doing so.
Too messy. Sorry.
ReplyDeleteAlso, by reward, I mean moral reward, if that makes sense.
This is totally out there because there's no evidence for it in the text itself, but on a couple of occasions I wondered whether maybe Tom was impotent like the war-damaged Jake in "The Sun Also Rises." I mean, in Tom's case the problem might have arisen before the war, because he makes a point of saying that Vinny "almost certainly bedded" other men before he even went to the war. So it's not like she just got lonely while he was away and dated a few guys. She was doing that before he left, but why? Was she just cold-hearted? Did she have some kind of nymphomania? Or was she looking, like Lady Brett, for something that Tom couldn't really give her? That would explain why he was willing to endure his marriage and why he didn't try very hard with the person he considered the love of his life. His heart, like Jake's, was willing, but the body wasn't. Wouldn't he have been more explicit about that, though?
ReplyDeleteHe probably would've been more explicit about it, but it's certainly an interesting thought.
ReplyDeleteHe did seem sort of emotionally impotent.