I say “courage,” but it may be something else. Those who have not taken this step, who have not come to terms with themselves, are not necessarily frightened, they are perhaps helpless, disoriented, lost as one is in the middle of a forest that’s too dark or dense or vast.
The son continues his story. In the drawer there was another letter, enclosed in a sealed envelope, slightly yellowed, with no mention of a recipient. He didn’t think it was anything at all, maybe an invoice or some kind of official document. He opened it with some apprehension, fearing that it could be a paper detailing his father’s last wishes; just as he had imagined, Thomas was in fact the author of the letter.
He says: It’s a letter that was written a long time ago but never sent. It’s addressed to you. It starts with your first name.
It dates from August 1984.
* * *
I stare at Lucas. The series of revelations causes a sound to reverberate in my ears, the kind of distorted humming noise that an amplifier makes when it’s shorting out. To escape this sound, I say: Did you read it? He answers yes. He pulls the letter out of his jacket pocket and hands it to me. It’s a little wrinkled, folded in two. He says: That’s why I asked to see you, so I could give it to you.
He adds: I would prefer that you read it later, when I’m gone, because it’s a story between him and you, just between the two of you.
I say okay and take the letter. I wonder if, rather, he fears my distress and wishes to spare me from having a witness.
After, there is silence. Long minutes of silence. Because there is nothing more to say, because everything has been said. Because now there is only the need to leave one another but we can’t quite bring ourselves to do it. We would like to stay together a little longer, to hold back the moment, because we both know that it’s the last time, that there will be no more.
I end up saying: What are you going to do now?
He says: I’m going back to California. I booked a ticket for Sunday morning. Home is there now. I have nothing here. No more ties . . .
There is more silence.
He is the one who speaks again: What about you? You will write about this story, won’t you? You won’t be able to stop yourself.
I repeat that I never write about my life, that I’m a novelist.
He smiles: Another one of your lies, right?
I smile back at him. Will you allow me to write about it?
He shrugs: I have nothing to forbid.
* * *
Finally, he gets up. Slowly I do the same. He shakes my hand and then leaves without another word. All the same, the gesture lasts a little longer than custom demands. There is no ambiguity, just an extra moment of pressure, somehow in keeping with the extraordinary singularity of what has occurred between us.
I watch him walk away, down the stairs, out of the café, and out of sight.
I sit down with Thomas’s letter still folded in my left hand. I think it would be better not to read it, what good can it do? It will only hurt me. He wouldn’t have wanted me to read it, otherwise he would have sent it. But then Lucas’s conviction comes back to me: I guess he wanted me to find them.
So I unfold the paper and the written words appear. I hear the voice of Thomas, his voice in 1984, the voice of our youth.
Philippe, I’m going to Spain and I’m not coming back, at least not right away. You are going to Bordeaux and I know it will be only the first step in a long journey. I always knew you were made for somewhere else. Our paths are separating. I know you would have liked for things to be different, for me to say the words that would have reassured you, but I could not, and I never knew how to talk anyway. In the end, I tell myself that you understood. It was love, of course. And tomorrow, there will be a great emptiness. But we could not continue—you have your life waiting for you, and I will never change. I just wanted to write to tell you that I have been happy during these months together, that I have never been so happy, and that I already know I will never be so happy again.
A Scribner Reading Group Guide
Lie With Me
Philippe Besson
This reading group guide for Lie With Me includes an introduction, discussion questions, and ideas for enhancing your book club. The suggested questions are intended to help your reading group find new and interesting angles and topics for your discussion. We hope that these ideas will enrich your conversation and increase your enjoyment of the book.
Introduction
The award-winning, bestselling French novel by Philippe Besson—“the French Brokeback Mountain” (Elle)—tells the story of an affair between two teenage boys in 1984 France, translated with subtle beauty and haunting lyricism by the iconic and internationally acclaimed actress/writer Molly Ringwald.
Just outside a hotel in Bordeaux, Philippe chances upon a young man who bears a striking resemblance to his first love. What follows is a look back at the relationship he’s never forgotten, a hidden affair with a boy named Thomas during their last year of high school. Without acknowledging they know each other in the halls, they steal time to meet in secret, carrying on a passionate, world-altering affair.
Dazzlingly rendered in English by Ringwald in her first-ever translation, Besson’s powerfully moving coming-of-age story captures the eroticism and tenderness of first love—and the heartbreaking passage of time.
Topics & Questions for Discussion
1. At the beginning of the novel, Philippe, the narrator, reflects on his love of inventing stories about strangers’ lives. How does this set your expectations?
2. Young Philippe excels academically but is somewhat of a loner socially. How does Besson explore Philippe’s status in his hometown?
3. Philippe says that he often writes about the “unexpected juxtapositions that shift the course of a life” in his adult years. How did such a moment come to pass with Thomas?
4. Philippe fears Thomas’s abandonment so intensely it is as if he is a child again. What memory does he use to conjure this fear?
5. There are many things Philippe never says to Thomas about his feelings, fears, and desires—but they do communicate through songs, films, and novels. How do the stories they discuss together build a sense of time and place in the novel?
6. Thomas and Philippe’s love affair takes place before the peak of the HIV/AIDS epidemic. How does the adult narrator’s awareness of this impending tragedy deepen the novel’s note of elegy?
7. Thomas believes Philippe is “a boy of books, from somewhere else,” who will inevitably leave their small town. Is this the most important difference between the two of them? What are some other significant differences?
8. How does Besson distinguish the narrator’s story from his own life? What effect does naming the character after himself have on your reading of the novel?
9. Philippe feels devastatingly jealous when he watches a female classmate flirt with Thomas at a party. How does he manage this jealousy? Can you think of other scenes from novels or films where two lovers are separated by jealousy and misunderstanding?
10. Philippe takes a photograph of Thomas just after they get the results of their final exams. Why does he believe Thomas lets him take this picture? Could there be an alternate explanation?
11. Philippe writes that, after he learns that Thomas will stay in Spain, he “erase[s]” him. What does he mean by this? Is this true, or even possible?
12. Why does Philippe have such a strong reaction when he sees “this image that cannot exist”—Thomas’s son—in 2007?
13. After speaking to Thomas’s son, why doesn’t Philippe call Thomas? What reasons does he give for hesitating?
14. Philippe wonders what Thomas was thinking at the moment of his marriage, and much later, when he makes another major life change. Is this just another example of Philippe’s “telling stories,” or does this imagining speak to something more? In the end, after decades, did he really know Thomas?
15. Thomas’s letter makes a dramatic predict
ion about their futures. Did it come true? If so, why do you think that is?
Enhance Your Book Club
1. A line from Marguerite Duras’s The Lover is used as one of the epigraphs for Lie With Me. Chronicling an affair between a teenage French girl and an older Chinese man, The Lover is an autobiographical novel first published in English in 1984. Read The Lover, and discuss its similarities with and differences from Lie With Me.
2. Read Besson’s other works that have been translated into English, such as In the Absence of Men or His Brother, or Ringwald’s When It Happens to You.
3. Watch Son frère, a French movie based on Besson’s His Brother.
About the Author
© MAXIME REYCHMAN
PHILIPPE BESSON is an author, screenwriter, and playwright. His first novel, In the Absence of Men, was awarded the Emmanuel Roblès Prize in 2001, and he is also the author of, among other books, Late Autumn (Grand Prize RTL-Lire), A Boy from Italy, and The Atlantic House. In 2017 he published Lie With Me, which has sold more than 120,000 copies and was awarded the Maison de la Presse Prize, and A Character from a Novel, an intimate portrait of Emmanuel Macron during his presidential campaign. His novels have been translated into twenty languages.
© DIANA RAGLAND
MOLLY RINGWALD’s writing has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Guardian, and Vogue, and she is the author of the bestselling novel-in-stories When It Happens to You.
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This book is a work of fiction. Any references to historical events, real people, or real places are used fictitiously. Other names, characters, places, and events are products of the author’s imagination, and any resemblance to actual events or places or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.
Copyright © 2017 by Éditions Julliard, Paris
English language translation copyright © 2019 by Ringwald Inc.
Originally published in France in 2017 by Éditions Julliard, Paris as Arrête avec tes mensonges
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available.
ISBN 978-1-9821-3260-6
ISBN 978-1-5011-9789-5 (ebook)
Lie With Me Page 11