Giovanni's Room 'And Moonlight'

What is love? This question has been with us since the beginning of time. Love cannot be defined as something tangible, it is something that is boundless. It is something that can be expanded by everyone’s personality and something that everyone can choose to create for him or her. The idea of love can change from person to person and time by time. We all must need and want love at some point inF our life. Finding love is not an easy path and the search for love can become a mask to cover someone’s true identity. But some people cover their love as well as their true identity, because of the perceptions of the people around them or the society they live in. That’s exactly what happened in “Giovanni’s Room” and “Moonlight”.

The tragedy of “Giovanni’s

Chiron needed love because he lacked it throughout his life. Everyone seeks to love freely, so does Chiron, but he cannot express his love freely because he often gets frustrated by notions of what is socially acceptable. The most noticeable examples of this are Chiron's relationships to Kevin, Paula, Juan and Teressa. As a child, his ability to love was at stake when he was with Paula (Chiron’s mom) because she was only able to get ahold of her love for her son late in life. So, a little bit of love by Juan and Teressa attracted Chiron so much that he started spending time with them more than his mom because he felt comfortable and secure. But most important was his love for Kevin. But, because of the stereotypes made by our society Chiron and Kevin are made to feel embarrassed by their love for each other as teenage boys. Chiron hid his love inside him but never forgot it. By the time he became an adult, he changed his outer appearance completely, in a way that people think of him as more masculine and normal. He became a drug dealer, he went into a world he never belonged to and hated it as a child. A devastating realization, an evidence of the fact that societal forces shaped Chiron into a hyper-masculine version of himself have destroyed his true identity. Yet, he never changed internally because he still had the same love for Kevin which was shown by the fact that he never interacted sexually with anyone after Kevin, as he says, “You're the only man that's ever touched me. The only one. I haven't really touched anyone since.” (Moonlight Black). It was an attempt from Chiron to find love and comfort. And a testimony of the fact that he never found happiness and comfort because he had no love. The forces working against Chiron acting on his feelings towards other men have prevented him from ever finding the solace he once found in Kevin. We are left