“Written on the body is a secret code only visible in certain lights; the accumulations of a lifetime gather there… I like to keep my body rolled up away from prying eyes. Never unfold too much, tell the whole story. I didn’t know that Louise would have reading hands. She has translated me into her own book.” (89)
Louise has the reading hands that can translate the code that is written on the narrator’s body, which as the narrator informs us is a difficult task considering she informs us as readers that she closes herself off to people who could decipher her code. Louise not only translates the code of the narrator, but “translated me into her own book,” made the narrator’s story a part of her story. The passage is beautifully linked to the narrator’s own life and career as a translator; the narrator can translate Russian, but the Louise can translate and understand the narrator.
Louise seems to have a profound transformational effect on the narrator’s outlook on life, love and relationships throughout the text, but is explicitly clear in this passage. I think this passage remarks on some of the previous stories of the narrator’s past relationship, all of which involved a partner which failed to translate the “secret code” written on their body. The passage shows that Louise was the first of the narrator’s partners to translate them, understand them, and bring them “into her own book.” I think that the narrator’s obsession with Louise throughout the remainder of this book can be explained by this passage, that the code that allows them to love unconditionally (especially important, considering Louise is still married at the time,) and is eventually able to measure the love they felt for Louise by losing her.
Your blog post was very thoughtful, all the connections you made with the narrators use of the word code were ones I had not made so it was interesting to see the little things in the novel that I interpreted in a different way. Another blog post was about people changing and how Louise changed the narrator’s outlook on love. This is very similar to when your talking about how Louise made the narrators story apart of her story and that she was the first person to translate the narrators code. You say that Louise has translated the code, so does this mean you believe they were actually reunited at the end?
I like the way you described the use of language. I agree that the language in the book transcribes a certain kind of power, defying norms that are unwritten and giving the narrator the room to not have to define their gender and the power that Louise gives to them.