Call Me by Your Name

 I was not expecting to like this book, mainly because I have seen the movie and did not particularly like it. But it was a cute story. It was a cute book. Now, they say that standards are good but double standards are better. There are multiple sex passages and sex references in this book. Normally I would be put off by that. I find modern descriptions of sex in contemporary literature rather gratuitous. That, for example, is part of the reason why I tend not to like things written by Haruki Murakami. But I have mostly read books that deal with heterosexual sex. For that reason, it feels somewhat unfair that this book, with its various descriptions of homosexual sex between men, did not elicit in me a similar criticism of the prose. I wonder whether Hannah Fidell, the creator behind FX on Hulu's series "A Teacher", would also hold this book to a double standard. A quick reminder: "A Teacher" is scathingly critical of sexual relationships between adults and minors. The female teacher in that series was severely punished and there was no mercy shown to her for the sexual relationship she had with a male minor. I wonder what Hannah Fidell would think of a sexual relationship between an adult male graduate student and a male minor. Clearly, André Aciman thinks there is nothing wrong with that. Quite the opposite. Am I missing something? Is there an argument I am not seeing that explains why the creator of "A Teacher" and the author of Call Me by Your Name reach polar opposite conclusions about the same kind of sexual relationship? Or could it be that Elon Musk is at least partly right in saying that there is a woke mind virus that is infecting the minds of many in the United States? I would like to know. Verdict on the relationship between Emmanuel Macron and his wife: pending—it will depend on whether the judge is Hannah Fidell or André Aciman.