#tgf analysis

[heterodickpaper]

so, question: is kotku that bad or it's just because of theo's pov? personally, i can't hate her. and i tried.

first of all i love this ask tgf women fans rise up!!!

ok so i don’t have a definitive answer; like most things about tgf i feel like it’s up for interpretation, but i do have a lot of thoughts! i've actually been meaning to write a character analysis of boris heavily based on their relationship but i'll try to keep this mostly about kotku.

i’m not quite sure what you mean by “that bad,” if you mean like as bad as theo makes her out to be then i’m gonna say no. theo’s qualms with her mostly lie with her encroachment on his time with boris and the fact that she’s on boris’ mind 24/7. i think his hatred of her stems from jealousy rather than any issues with her personality (little tangent just to say that i think it's super funny that he doesn't seem to recognize that in some ways boris' infatuation with kotku is very similar to his own fixation on pippa). even he, in spite of his hatred of kotku, makes it pretty clear that she herself doesn’t really do anything that bad? at most she’s a little rude to her 15yo boyfriend’s friend which is honestly valid (not so sure abt the 18yo/15yo relationship that might make her "bad" but i don’t reeeaaally feel like it’s relevant here and also every choice anyone makes in the vegas chapters is morally questionable so). also from what the book tells us she's not any worse to boris than he is to her--so i wouldn't say she's manipulative or trying to take boris from theo either; she barely interacts with him.

the thing that's stuck with me most about her is what she says when theo's dad dies. boris calls her to tell her the news, as he's supposed to go over to her house--he would have gone but theo begged him to stay. she tells boris to stay with theo--she knows what it's like; she also lost her father. now i think this has some really interesting implications about boris too but i'm focusing on kotku! her reaction, in almost any other circumstance, would seem like nothing more than basic human decency. but it wasn't boris' first instinct to stay with theo, and in that context it would have been less surprising if kotku did make him leave. even theo seemed to have expected that outcome--he says "" (). we know that theo is an unreliable narrator, and his descriptions of people or events are often heavily shaded by personal bias. in this case, he's biased against kotku, but even that couldn't make her actions on the night of his dad's death seem bad. and if he was that wrong about her then, it makes sense to assume that his view of her is far from accurate.

and i don't hate her either! i think some people dislike her mostly because she gets in the way of boris/theo, which i understand because i love boris/theo but i think almost all the tgf relationships have a lot of potential! and boris and kotku have a really fun (if messed up) dynamic. they're like a couple who's been married 40 years but still haven't decided whether they're soulmates or archenemies.

[weltonreject]

God, how do you think boris felt when he saw theo again and realized that theo wasn't being himself, wasn't letting himself be happy?

I always think about that last moment Boris saw Theo, bags packed in seconds and yelling that he was completely alone and that no one was in Nevada for him. That Theo was distraught and scrambling to keep his life in one piece. Boris kissed that Theo, almost like glue for all his cracks, you know? Hoping to adhere all his fractured reality into coherence as he went across the country and left Boris alone with his father again... Then to see him again. First off, to recognize him? That tells me that Boris had been looking in every face he ever passed for Theo-- for a certain Theo. One that made it out alive and together and to a life he wanted. Then he sees this Theo. An unhappy, repressed, still-scrambling version of the boy he ran from in Vegas.

While, obviously, Boris is worried for his friend. I feel like he’d feel guilty. Like his kiss, his good bye, wasn’t enough? That was his last well wish he could offer Theo before he escaped. It was his promise that Theo would never be alone again, even as he tried to pick up his life in New York-- the life he left because of circumstance only Boris really knew. Had Boris not been any help? Or, in Boris’s worst fear, was he part of the reason Theo was still so unhappy? That first call of “Potter?” was an apology.

Boris was probably so crushed, so worried in such an uncertain way, but also so relieved. Theo was alive. He’d been looking for him in every single face and voice, and he finally found him. Ships colliding!

[weltonreject]

literally the moment in tgf that makes me scream the most is the fact that boris just gave theo his dads lighter when he was just ADMIRING it. like he just put it in his backpack without him asking. god im a sucker for wordless acts of love

wait i’m having a lot of thoughts about boris giving things wordlessly over to theo-- like the painting was a wordless (involuntary) swap between them, and was theo’s heart. i’m thinking about boris’s wordless, maybe timid, trade (confession??) being a lighter. something that starts fires-- something that can cause an explosion....

[weltonreject]

have you ever gone over your thoughts on pippa and kitsey as characters? if not, i'd love your take if you're up for it!

I don’t think I have! I’m not sure what avenue to take in exploring them (if you have any in mind) but I think they’re both really interesting women. pippa has such a rich background and narrative arc-- that theo just doesn’t acknowledge. i mean? she’s being raised by her gay uncle and his husband, suddenly being taken by the one that “isn’t related to her”, going to school in Europe (with nuns right??), losing her one passion to her injury which leaves her without a way to cope, then being fucking romanticized by this kid that stayed at her house a lot after her very traumatic accident... there’s so much to pippa. i think her and boris would be such good friends too. also popchyk would LOVE her.

and kitsey... god i know she’s messing around with tom and she pulls that “you don’t know what it’s like to love the wrong person” bit on theo that makes us YELL but. imagine being raised by mrs. barbour. imagine being her daughter when she so obviously has such a fixed perspective on what her (and kitsey’s) duty as a woman socialite and someone of wealth is. god, if only theo opened himself up to their lives too. he might’ve found some way to cope too...

[weltonreject]

Doubt it’d acc be healing but yeah, dude (also afsjdskl that’s great to hear- you’re a really talented writer and I’m sure you’ll go far)

hm yeah “healing”, i used rather than like. Recover or Process. But only as much as Theo Can Do, in the Long Amount of Time he can Do It. For some reason though, I do read the ending of the book as like him looking at the path (not embarking on though) mourning his mother Actually. Maybe that’s healing? Probably not in the way we Want or Hope, so I would still agree. Perchance it wouldn’t actually be Healing or Curing. But just him, being about to numb and zone out without drugs.

(and AH THANK YOU!! xoxoxo it’s so wild to think about that in a few years I might have a book on shelves???? my name will be on a cover??? I’ll be able to hype it up and tell you guys all about it and get excited with y’all!! you’ll know all the OG content and inspiration-- lil secret book club. I’m so excited for even just the process. Even now it feels rewarding, and I can’t wait to one day be able to actually (metaphorically) hand y’all a book ;____; )

[weltonreject]

Hey I mean I guess it would be a tragedy if you believe that Theo just ended up going back to kitsey (with the whole bird is chained to the pole, no matter how hard it tries to fly away, it’s doomed to always end up in the same place where it started wait is that supposed to- why am I thinking of relapse/drug addiction) but really idk (also those new projects of yours sound really cool :) I’d love to read one day if you ever put them up online or decide to get them published)

YEAH! I completely agree that going back to Kitsey is being trapped and being enclosed-- but is that his downfall? Would that keep him Safer or in another tail spin? Like, to me the ending is not liberation via introspection, but a kind of admittance of exhaustion. He nearly died, nearly got arrested, nearly got killed, thought he’d never see his best friend again-- and now probably won’t-- but now he’s back in the states, he’s back with Hobie and the Barbours and it’s just. Average. It’s that empty suburban life he can predict. Yes, he hates them yes, he pay start Coping with drugs and alcohol again (not saying that lightly or nonchalantly though; that’s awful), but he seems to not have any intentions of Fighting it. And not in the scary self-destruction way that we saw in Amsterdam, but in the passive “please don’t ask very much from me while I heal”. He needs a world that’s already built (Manhattan “high society”) that he can operate in without too much being asked of him. He can be tired but still function with a job and a life and perchance a “family”. Maybe it’s just projection, but at the end Theo seems tired and instead of cutting ties, he’s just trying to cut himself a break so he doesn’t grenade his life again when it all piles up. It’s awful and it doesn’t feel great, but it’s not his end; he’s trying to give himself somewhere to go, to live, and makes it (in some way/in this angle) not as tragic, in the traditional sense. But I do definitely agree that there is tragedy in being chained and only being able to fly in the same radius again and again and again.

[weltonreject]

If it weren’t for that ending I’d call the goldfinch a tragedy

I was going to ask what about the ending makes the book not a tragedy, but I guess you’re right! That ending is Theo trying to prevent his own downfall in the tiniest way that he can. He does give his life hope and value and attempts to cling to the edge of the cliff. I guess I see it as tragic because I assume he doesn’t want those things, but if it prevents a further spiral-- the events of the entire book being bc he keeps fighting himself without any help or hope-- then I guess it is a... happier ending? He’s alive and the goldfinch is safe. That’s all he really could’ve hoped for, huh?

[weltonreject]

So uhh the last 4 digits of boris’ phone number were supposed to be the combination to the locker where Theo’s supposed metaphorical heart was supposed to be hidden. I don’t know what this means but ok Theo ok.

and the fact that the locker with said combo never actually held the painting is... what the fuck. theo thought he could bar the painting, his heart, behind the memory of boris-- something that he’ll never need to write down because he’ll never forget boris-- but this is the only way he can honor him bc he can’t SAY anything about their friendship in his New Crowd. almost as if theo could practice typing in the numbers like it was boris’s phone number because he’d never actually call him, never actually have the courage or the words. of course theo never opened the “painting” why would he need to? the real intricate ritual was the combination, was getting to remember boris every so often and pretend.

and further more the fact that he would use boris’ phone number-- boris being the memory trusted with the storage locker-- really shows theo either 1. vaguely remembered showing boris the painting so those connections were Made or 2. he considers boris the only other very well kept secret in his life...