How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #4
Her voice vibrating the tiny bones deep inside his ear. Her voice stays inside him, becomes him. She is singing her part to him, and to a thousand other people. He is anonymous, equal, loved. (2.102)
Huh? Mr. Hosokawa's daydream about being in the audience during Roxane Coss' singing is kind of weird at first. What's it mean to be anonymous and loved? Isn't knowing the person you love, like, required? To take a stab at it, maybe Bel Canto is saying there's a way that a performer can give the music as a gift of love to the whole audience, and each individual listening can receive that love with the same delight you'd feel if your favorite pop star sang a song just for you. Bel Canto seems to think so, anyway.
Quote #5
How quickly one could form attachments under circumstances like these, what bold conclusions a man could come to: Roxane Coss was the woman he had always loved; Gen Watanabe was his son; his house was no longer his own; his life as he knew it, his political life, was dead. Ruben Iglesias wondered if all hostages, all over the world, felt more or less the same way. (2.149)
Roses are red, violets are blue, I'm in a hostage crisis and so are you…We're betting most people don't write this on their Valentines. But maybe Ruben Iglesias has a point here. Maybe intense and dangerous experiences makes us more willing to risk looking silly and show affection for others. Maybe love grows when things are tough, whether it's romance or friendship.
Quote #6
Father Arguedas felt a rush of tenderness for this man [Roxane Coss' accompanist, dying of diabetes], an almost choking bond of love. He had played for her. He had heard her voice day after day and been shaped by it. With great sincerity he whispered, "I absolve you from your sins," into the chalk-white ear. (3.48)
If you can fall in love with the beauty of music, maybe you can somehow feel affection for people who are near that beauty. Maybe in Bel Canto beauty rubs off on those close to it and makes people feel more intensely for each other. Might be a good idea to practice those scales on the clarinet after all.