From the Bookshelf of The Challenge Factory…

Giovanni’s Room

James Baldwin

Start date: May 15, 2024

Finish date: May 31, 2024

Discussion: Archived-A Year of Banned Books

Discussion leader: Erica

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Archived-A Year of Banned Books

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* Reading List
By Erica , Quality Control Supervisor · 1 post · 96 views

last updated Dec 12, 2023 04:05PM

* A Year of Banned Books Info
By Erica , Quality Control Supervisor · 1 post · 122 views

last updated Dec 12, 2023 03:53PM

What Members Thought

Mar 02, 2020 Book Concierge rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: audio, france, literary-fiction, relationships, tragedy, lgbtq, concierge, library, drama

Digital audiobook performed by Dan Butler.

A classic of gay literature explores the coming of age of a young American living in Paris in the 1950s. Torn between his fiancé and the bartender he meets and comes to love, David struggles to find a way to be true to himself.

I don’t know how I came across this little gem of a novel. But I’m so glad I’ve read it. Baldwin’s writing is evocative and atmospheric. His characters are well drawn and reveal their strengths and weaknesses through their thought ...more

5 likes · Like · see review

Mar 29, 2025 Nicole Field rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Devastating novel of self destruction, self denial and self loathing, set in 1950s Paris with a young American man named David who falls in love with an Italian called Giovanni.

That's how this book was promoted to me. But I want to make very clear that it is not a love story. It is a short tragedy about self discovery coming too late and a man losing everything, including both the loves he could have held, because he learned about himself too late.

So we have David. Our main character, typicall Devastating novel of self destruction, self denial and self loathing, set in 1950s Paris with a young American man named David who falls in love with an Italian called Giovanni.

That's how this book was promoted to me. But I want to make very clear that it is not a love story. It is a short tragedy about self discovery coming too late and a man losing everything, including both the loves he could have held, because he learned about himself too late.

So we have David. Our main character, typically repressed American who, though not currently in America, is definitely continuing on as though his love of men is something that is viewed as illegal outside of the States. He meets a couple of 'fairies', not the type with wings, in the characters of Jacques and Guillaume.

It seems as though these two characters are quite dispicable and, to be fair, when David's mistress Hella returns from Spain, she certainly finds Jacques at least to be quite abhorrent. But I feel as though, as is often the case in an unreliable narrator, the way a character feels towards Jacques says more about their own discomfort than the character himself. Jacques, as it turns out, seems almost more loyal and consistent than many of the characters of this book.

We hear from David about his strained relationship with his father before he moved out as well as a singular experience with another boy that showed David something of what he really wanted himself. But, when the narrative finds him, David is playing all sorts of games and pretending that what he wants isn't really want he wants. He's holding his peers at arms length even though both he and they know exactly who and what David desires.

And then David meets Giovanni. And Giovanni is like this ray of sunshine that, despite all of David's efforts, he really can't quite manage to dim. At least not on first impressions. It really interesting because this is the point where David's own self loathing really shines through. He recounts his first memories of Giovanni as though there is nothing at all objectionable about Giovanni. He is the best of characters, he is the best of friends. His charisma has everyone at the bar where he works wanting more of his company but, for some reason, he keeps talking to David.

This doesn't make sense to David's view of the world and the push and pull that ensues is both vicious and heartbreaking. He wants to part from Giovanni right from the start but literally cannot make himself do it. At every moment we see them together, we see Giovanni falling more and more in love with David, even as David is dropping comments the whole way about how temporary this whole set up must be.

All around him, both Giovanni and Jacques present wisdom to David time and again that he willfully rejects or neglects to pay any attention to. Throughout it all, the return of his mistress, Hella, from Spain is presented as the looming threat but, honestly, it's an empty one. David does all the damage a single person can do.

This is possibly the best modern tragedy I've ever read. ...more

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