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Call Me By Your Name (07 Edition)

by Andre Aciman

Call Me By Your Name (07 Edition) Cover

ISBN13: 9780374299217
ISBN10: 0374299218
Condition: Student Owned
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Synopses & Reviews

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Publisher Comments:

Call Me by Your Name is the story of a sudden and powerful romance that blossoms between an adolescent boy and a summer guest at his parents' cliff-side mansion on the Italian Riviera. Unprepared for the consequences of their attraction, at first each feigns indifference. But during the restless summer weeks that follow, unrelenting buried currents of obsession and fear, fascination and desire, intensify their passion as they test the charged ground between them. What grows from the depths of their spirits is a romance of scarcely six weeks duration and an experience that marks them for a lifetime. For what the two discover on the Riviera and during a sultry evening in Rome is the one thing both already fear they may never truly find again: total intimacy.
 
The psychological maneuvers that accompany attraction have seldom been more shrewdly captured than in André Acimans frank, unsentimental, heartrending elegy to human passion. Call Me by Your Name is clear-eyed, bare-knuckled, and ultimately unforgettable.
André Aciman is the author of Out of Egypt (FSG, 1995) and False Papers (FSG, 2000), and the editor of The Proust Project (FSG, 2004). He teaches comparative literature at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He lives with his family in Manhattan.
A New York Times Notable Book of the Year
A San Francisco Chronicle Notable Book of the Year
A Chicago Tribune Favorite Book of the Year
A Seattle Times Favorite Book of the Year
 
Call Me by Your Name is the story of a sudden and powerful romance that blossoms between an adolescent boy and a summer guest at his parents' cliff-side mansion on the Italian Riviera. Unprepared for the consequences of their attraction, at first each feigns indifference. But during the restless summer weeks that follow, unrelenting buried currents of obsession and fear, fascination and desire, intensify their passion as they test the charged ground between them. What grows is a romance of scarcely six weeks' duration and an experience that marks them for a lifetime. What the two discover on the Riviera and during an evening together in Rome is the one thing both already fear they may never truly find again: total intimacy.
"A coming-of-age story, coming-out story, a Proustian meditation on time and desire, a love letter, an invocation and something of an epitaph, Call Me by Your Name is also an open question. It is an exceptionally beautiful book that cannot quite bring itself to draw the inevitable conclusion about axis-shifting passion that men and women of the world might like to think they will always reachthat that obscure object of desire is, by definition, ungraspable, indeterminate and already lost at exactly the moment you rush so fervently to hold him or her . . . Aciman, who has written so exquisitely about exile, loss and Proust in his book of essays, False Papers, and his memoir, Out of Egypt, is no less exquisite here."Stacey D'Erasmo, The New York Times Book Review
 
"Acimans first novel shows him to be an acute grammarian of desire. When Oliver, a handsome young American philosopher, arrives in a seaside town in Italy . . . the son of the house, Elioseventeen, studious, moody, and ravenousfalls for him. Elios edgy rapture as he forms himself in relation to another plays out against the background of a scorching Mediterranean summer, and Aciman introduces a small universe of characters who are themselves altered by the charged air that surrounds the lovers: Elios mother, who calls Oliver il cauboi (the cowboy); his generous, hazy father; and the household's cantankerous cook, who every morning carefully cracks open the American's soft-boiled eggs."The New Yorker
 
"Call Me by Your Name is a . . . wise book, written with both lightness and concentrated care for the precise truth of every moment in its drama."Colm Toíbín, author of The Master
 
"Beautifully rendered, evocative, and sexually charged, Call Me by Your Name is the Egyptian-born, Sephardic Jew André Aciman's first novel. His previous two books, the essay collection False Papers and his memoir Out of Egypt, focused on memory and exile. Hereto critical acclaimhe explores a love affair between an adolescent and a young, seductive man. Critics universally praised Aciman's bold account of obsession and lust and his elegant, sensuous prose. Like few other writers, Aciman evokes a time and place exquisitelythe sunny Italian countryside with its summer heat, the pungent blooms, the sprawling vistas."Bookmarks Magazine
 
"A meditation on sexual longing as well as an exploration of the selfishness that such longing engenders. The author's beautiful articulation of the thrill and dismay of unspoken desire underscores the misunderstandings inherent in such a state . . . Aciman's debut is nimble, poised, perceptive, and intelligent. Its emphasis on psychology over plot does not leave it lacking in drive and movement. The novel depicts a male teenager who, although practiced in having to accept his parents' summer guests at their Italian seaside villa, is slammed by an unexpected provocation when . . . a male graduate student arrives, and his obvious intelligence and charm are matched by an undisguised sexiness. What is disguised, at least initially, is the attraction the boy and the graduate student feel for each other."Brad Hooper, Booklist
 
"Elio's and Oliver's interactions range from frosty to torrid as they face uncertainty about their own identities, come to terms with their feelings for each other, and, ultimately, decide to take a risk on this relationship. In his first work of fiction, Aciman (Out of Egypt) describes Elio's anxiety, uncertainty, awkwardness, and, later, passion in incredibly vivid detail, leaving no thought process unexplored. The strong bond between the two characters is reminiscent of the bond between Ennis and Jack in Brokeback Mountain, where each finds in the other the one true love of his life."Sarah Conrad Weisman, Corning Community College, New York, Library Journal
 
"Oliver, the handsome American visitor, charms everyone he meets with his cavalier manner. Elio's narrative dwells on the minutiae of his meandering thoughts and growing desire for Oliver. What begins as a casual friendship develops into a passionate yet clandestine affair, and the last chapters fast-forward through Elio's life to a reunion with Oliver decades later. Elio recalls the events of that summer and the years that follow in a voice that is by turns impatient and tender. He expresses his feelings with utter candor, sharing with readers his most private hopes, urges, and insecurities. The intimacy Elio experiences with Oliver is unparalleled and awakens in the protagonist an intensity that dances on the brink of obsession. Although their contact in the ensuing years is limited to the occasional phone call or postcard, Elio continues to harbor an insatiable desire for Oliver. His longing creates a tension that

Review:

"Egyptian-born Aciman is the author of the acclaimed memoir Out of Egypt and of the essay collection False Papers. His first novel poignantly probes a boy's erotic coming-of-age at his family's Italian Mediterranean home. Elio — 17, extremely well-read, sensitive and the son of a prominent expatriate professor — finds himself troublingly attracted to this year's visiting resident scholar, recruited by his father from an American university. Oliver is 24, breezy and spontaneous, and at work on a book about Heraclitus. The young men loll about in bathing suits, play tennis, jog along the Italian Riviera and flirt. Both also flirt (and more) with women among their circle of friends, but Elio, who narrates, yearns for Oliver. Their shared literary interests and Jewishness help impart a sense of intimacy, and when they do consummate their passion in Oliver's room, they call each other by the other's name. A trip to Rome, sanctioned by Elio's prescient father, ushers Elio fully into first love's joy and pain, and his travails set up a well-managed look into Elio's future. Aciman overcomes an occasionally awkward structure with elegant writing in Elio's sweet and sanguine voice." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)

Review:

"If you have ever been the willing victim of obsessive love — a force greater than yourself that pulls you inextricably toward the object of your desire — you will recognize every nuance of Andre Aciman's superb new novel, 'Call Me by Your Name.'

The story unfolds in the spacious home of an academic who hosts a new student every year on the Italian coast, near Genoa. One summer's visitor... Washington Post Book Review (read the entire Washington Post review)

Synopsis:

This heartrending elegy to human passion is the story of a sudden and powerful romance that blossoms between an adolescent boy and a summer guest at his parents' house, a cliffside mansion on the Italian Riviera.

Synopsis:

A New York Times Notable Book of the Year

A Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year

A Washington Post Best Fiction Book of the Year

A New York Magazine “Future Canon” Selection

A Chicago Tribune Favorite Book of the Year

One of The Seattle Times Michael Upchurchs Favorite Books of the Year

An Amazon Top 100 Editors Picks of the Year

An Amazon Top 10 Editors pick: Debut Fiction (#6)

An Amazon Top 10 Editors pick: Gay & Lesbian (#1)

 

Call Me by Your Name is the story of a sudden and powerful romance that blossoms between an adolescent boy and a summer guest at his parents' cliffside mansion on the Italian Riviera.  During the restless summer weeks, unrelenting but buried currents of obsession, fascination, and desire intensify their passion as they test the charged ground between them and verge toward the one thing both already fear they may never truly find again: total intimacy. André Aciman's critically acclaimed debut novel is a frank, unsentimental, heartrending elegy to human passion. 

Synopsis:

Call Me by Your Name is the story of a sudden and powerful romance that blossoms between an adolescent boy and a summer guest at his parents' cliff-side mansion on the Italian Riviera. Unprepared for the consequences of their attraction, at first each feigns indifference. But during the restless summer weeks that follow, unrelenting buried currents of obsession and fear, fascination and desire, intensify their passion as they test the charged ground between them. What grows from the depths of their spirits is a romance of scarcely six weeks' duration and an experience that marks them for a lifetime. For what the two discover on the Riviera and during a sultry evening in Rome is the one thing both already fear they may never truly find again: total intimacy.
 
The psychological maneuvers that accompany attraction have seldom been more shrewdly captured than in Andr Aciman's frank, unsentimental, heartrending elegy to human passion. Call Me by Your Name is clear-eyed, bare-knuckled, and ultimately unforgettable.
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About the Author

André Aciman is the author of Out of Egypt and False Papers, and the editor of The Proust Project. He teaches comparative literature at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. He lives with his family in Manhattan.

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What Our Readers Are Saying

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Average customer rating based on 3 comments:
Grady Harp, February 6, 2008 (view all comments by Grady Harp)
Reflections on a Summer of Love

CALL ME BY YOUR NAME is one of those books so rich in story, in content, and in style of writing that it immediately becomes one of the great novels of the time. With this novel André Aciman steps into the rarefied air of writers such as Jamie O'Neill, Colm Toibin, Reinaldo Arenas, Constantine Cavafy, Edmund White, Michael Cunningham, and even EM Forster and Thomas Mann - a disparate group of luminaries, perhaps, but each with the ability to create an evocative, sensual love story beyond the limits of traditional tales. Though highly recommended by friends over the past year, this reader only now had the pleasure of reading this novel, and the result was to immediately read it again, so rich are the treasures this book holds.

Agreeing with other reviewers that telling too much of the plot is unfair to those who have yet to read Aciman's book, suffice it to say that CALL ME BY YOUR NAME is a meditation on the awakening of love, the myriad emotional and physical responses of the act of attraction developing into acting out and becoming an obsession, and the indelible mark that 'first love' makes on the hearts and lives of those involved.

Elio is a beautiful seventeen-year old lad, transcribing Haydn's 'The Seven Last Words of Christ' in his Mediterranean villa where his parents annually invite a young writer for a six-week residency to complete a work and assist the father in his own work. This summer the resident scholar is twenty-four-year old American scholar Oliver who is having his work on Heraclitus translated into Italian. There is an attraction between the two young men, a veiled dance of courtship, and an ultimate revelation of a profound love that becomes intensely physical as it develops from its intellectual and artistic beginnings. The 'love affair', as erotic as any in literature, is fully realized on a brief trip to Rome, and then the two part: Elio remains in Italy and Oliver returns to the US. And after the summer's transforming events Elio narrates the next twenty years, sharing the impact of his first experience with love with the reader. The title of the book echoes the words the lovers' exchange during intimacy: each becomes the other and in doing so completely acknowledges himself.

Aciman writes so eloquently, so sensually, and so intelligently that many passages beg re-reading as soon as the impact of a paragraph is complete. Quoting from the book is almost impossible: where would you start to isolate excerpts in a work that has no weak pages? Yes, this is a gay love story, but it is far more than that. This is a meditation on the miracle of the transformations love induces, and those transformations are universal. A book of such quality should find a wide audience: André Aciman is writer of rare genius. Highly recommended.

Grady Harp
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Mikeonalpha, February 17, 2007 (view all comments by Mikeonalpha)
"I look back on those days and regret none of it, not the risks, not the shame, not the total lack of foresight..." says the central protagonist of Andre Aciman's stunning novel of sexual obsession and love. Call Me by Your Name is really an astounding piece of writing, substantial and quite beautiful, the voluminous pages filled with constant references to literature, history and mythology.

Seventeen-year-old Elio lives on the Italian Riviera with his wealthy and academically minded parents. He indeed seems to live a charmed life, his days filled with swimming, reading, seaside walks, and playing tennis. Companionable, but with an almost constant need for attention, Elio has an obvious artistic bent and is well and truly grounded in music, literature and art.

Every summer for the past fifteen years, his parents have been playing host to a college student, their youthful guest being their way of helping young academics revise their budding manuscripts before publication. Throughout these months, they usually become part of the family and are given full run the house to do whatever they pleased.

This summer in particular is marked by the arrival of the twenty-five year-old Olivier, a suavely attractive and masculine American who oozes self-confidence and who immediately enchants Elio's parents by his one word send off, always brisk, bold and blunted: "later." Elio is not quite sure when the attraction starts, maybe it begins soon after Olivier's arrival during one of those "grinding lunches" when he sits next to Elio, or perhaps it starts on the beach, or even at the tennis court.

One thing is for sure, one event eventually leads to another, and Elio finds himself falling in lust with Olivier. Within two weeks, Elio begins to obsess, his teenage hormones and imagination running rampant as he fantasizes about every night, for Olivier just to leave his room, "not via the front door, but through the French windows on the balcony, and "to work his way into my body, gently and softly."

Although one realizes from the outset, that the longing will be eventually consummated, the inevitable coupling between Olivier and Elio is still seen as raw and indeed shocking, and is filled with a kind of brutal and wicked sensuality. The obsession continues and Elio starts to run the gamut of emotions from fear, to hunger, to ecstasy and then on to remorse, the "twisted into sudden pangs of guilt... shame trailed instant intimacy."

Spinning through Elio's lustful world, both he and Oliver dance an intricate ballet of courtship. At first, Olivier is standoffish, whilst Elio sees the older man as powerfully sexual, but also thoroughly alert and cold and a fully sagacious judge of character and situations - nothing he does or says is unpremeditated, "he sees through everybody."

Filtered though Elio's point of view and also deeply reflective, much of the action is driven by the titular boy's own inner dialog. He becomes convinced that no one in the world wants Olivier as physically as he does. He yearns for Olivier during the morning ritual after breakfast, whilst they are lying on the grass, or by the pool, or then swimming or jogging, " the afternoon hours, splendid and lush with abundant sun and silence..."

In this deeply evocative story, the author writes of the sexual side of human nature, where lust oozes from every corner, giving no quarter, indeed even Elio is somewhat shocked at his attraction to another man, and also about this "twisted skein of desire," where having someone's body to touch and being that someone longing to touch are one and the same.

Can intimacy endure once indecency is spent and our bodies run out of tricks? Aciman certainly thinks so as he charts Elio and Olivier's passionate relationship, as it eventually becomes a veil of love, culminating in a romantic kiss in Rome, where after a wondrous dinner and a poetry reading, Olivier presses Elio hard against the wall on via Santa Maria dell' Anima.

Although time and the years do eventually separate them, and all that remains is dream making and a strange type of remembrance, their love is forever preserved, eternally cemented by the extraordinary hand of fate. Mike Leonard February 07.
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shoppingforstuff, February 10, 2007 (view all comments by shoppingforstuff)
It was obvious that the author is not gay. The protagonist's internal dialogue did not seem authentic -- e.g., he seemed too sexually charged/satisfied with sexual relationships with women. Also, he was extraordinarily neurotic.

I felt some of the situations described in the novel were odd and disturbing and did not add any real value -- e.g., the bodily excretion scene between the two leads.

Oliver's character was not fully developed. Here was a handsome, charming, gadfly man who is described as being able to have anyone he pleases and is somehow inexplicitly attracted to this neurotic, shy, boy. The relationship between the two felt like Elio had an unhealthy fixation rather than a mutually-shared affection.

Many times I felt the author was trying to impress the reader with his vocabulary than tell a story -- i.e., use a "big" word when a "small" word would have been satisfactory.

Finally, it was a variation of a story we've seen/read many times before -- the emotionally immature, lonely, and lost gay boy who is still emotionally-stunted, lonely, and lost as an adult -- Oliver's character gets to grow up, but Elio doesn't.

All that being said, it was emotionally moving -- not so much because of the writing, but because of the loss and loneliness of the lead character as well as him never being able to move on or find love as an adult.
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Product Details

ISBN:
9780374299217
Subtitle:
A Novel
Author:
Aciman, Andre
Author:
Aciman, Andr
Publisher:
Picador
Subject:
General
Subject:
Authors
Subject:
Gay
Subject:
Teenage boys
Subject:
General Fiction
Subject:
Literary
Subject:
Italy
Subject:
Love stories
Edition Description:
Trade Cloth
Publication Date:
20080122
Binding:
Electronic book text in proprietary or open standard format
Grade Level:
General/trade
Language:
English
Pages:
256
Dimensions:
8.27 x 5.48 x 0.685 in
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Call Me By Your Name (07 Edition) Used Hardcover
0 stars - 0 reviews
$12.00 In Stock
Product details 256 pages Farrar Straus Giroux - English 9780374299217 Reviews:
"Publishers Weekly Review" by , "Egyptian-born Aciman is the author of the acclaimed memoir Out of Egypt and of the essay collection False Papers. His first novel poignantly probes a boy's erotic coming-of-age at his family's Italian Mediterranean home. Elio — 17, extremely well-read, sensitive and the son of a prominent expatriate professor — finds himself troublingly attracted to this year's visiting resident scholar, recruited by his father from an American university. Oliver is 24, breezy and spontaneous, and at work on a book about Heraclitus. The young men loll about in bathing suits, play tennis, jog along the Italian Riviera and flirt. Both also flirt (and more) with women among their circle of friends, but Elio, who narrates, yearns for Oliver. Their shared literary interests and Jewishness help impart a sense of intimacy, and when they do consummate their passion in Oliver's room, they call each other by the other's name. A trip to Rome, sanctioned by Elio's prescient father, ushers Elio fully into first love's joy and pain, and his travails set up a well-managed look into Elio's future. Aciman overcomes an occasionally awkward structure with elegant writing in Elio's sweet and sanguine voice." Publishers Weekly (Copyright Reed Business Information, Inc.)
"Synopsis" by , This heartrending elegy to human passion is the story of a sudden and powerful romance that blossoms between an adolescent boy and a summer guest at his parents' house, a cliffside mansion on the Italian Riviera.
"Synopsis" by ,

A New York Times Notable Book of the Year

A Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year

A Washington Post Best Fiction Book of the Year

A New York Magazine “Future Canon” Selection

A Chicago Tribune Favorite Book of the Year

One of The Seattle Times Michael Upchurchs Favorite Books of the Year

An Amazon Top 100 Editors Picks of the Year

An Amazon Top 10 Editors pick: Debut Fiction (#6)

An Amazon Top 10 Editors pick: Gay & Lesbian (#1)

 

Call Me by Your Name is the story of a sudden and powerful romance that blossoms between an adolescent boy and a summer guest at his parents' cliffside mansion on the Italian Riviera.  During the restless summer weeks, unrelenting but buried currents of obsession, fascination, and desire intensify their passion as they test the charged ground between them and verge toward the one thing both already fear they may never truly find again: total intimacy. André Aciman's critically acclaimed debut novel is a frank, unsentimental, heartrending elegy to human passion. 

"Synopsis" by ,
Call Me by Your Name is the story of a sudden and powerful romance that blossoms between an adolescent boy and a summer guest at his parents' cliff-side mansion on the Italian Riviera. Unprepared for the consequences of their attraction, at first each feigns indifference. But during the restless summer weeks that follow, unrelenting buried currents of obsession and fear, fascination and desire, intensify their passion as they test the charged ground between them. What grows from the depths of their spirits is a romance of scarcely six weeks' duration and an experience that marks them for a lifetime. For what the two discover on the Riviera and during a sultry evening in Rome is the one thing both already fear they may never truly find again: total intimacy.
 
The psychological maneuvers that accompany attraction have seldom been more shrewdly captured than in Andr Aciman's frank, unsentimental, heartrending elegy to human passion. Call Me by Your Name is clear-eyed, bare-knuckled, and ultimately unforgettable.
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