How we cite our quotes: (Chapter.Paragraph)
Quote #7
"I lost something—nothing you can put a price on—just my memory." (31.26)
Bourne's being flip, but the reference to money is interesting. There is quite a bit of discussion about money and economics in The Bourne Identity. The first thing that Bourne does after he's recovered from being shot at the beginning of the novel is go to Zurich to get money out of an account. And, of course, Marie is an economist. And, if you think about it, Bourne's memory actually does have a price of sorts, in the money he takes from Treadstone, and in the lives lost while he thrashes around trying to figure out what he's doing. There's a suggestion here, maybe, that memory can actually have real world consequences, that remembering or forgetting does have a price that is measured in the world outside one's head.
Quote #8
Conklin was shouting, but Bourne could hardly hear him. Instead he heard two words and the jolts of pain hammered at his temples. Phnom Penh! Phnom Penh! Death in the skies, from the skies. Death of the young and the very young.Screeching birds and screaming machines and the deathlike stench of the jungle…and a river. He was blinded again,on fire again. (32.187)
This is one of the places where Bourne's amnesia flashback is a lot like a Vietnam flashback (see "Symbols: Flashbacks"). Bourne's remembering the death of his wife and child in an airplane attack. Does the traumatic memory recur because he's an amnesiac? Or does it recur because he's a veteran? Or does it happen because he's perpetuating violence? Would he have these flashbacks even if he had his memory?
Quote #9
Oh, God. Marie had said it.
Maybe you just know what you've been told…Over and over and over again. Until there was nothing else… Things you've been told…but you can't relive…because they're not you. (35.10-11)
Bourne realizes that his memories of being an assassin aren't real: they're just the cover story he memorized in order to trap Carlos. The last thing he says is odd though; "Things you've been told…but you can't relive…because they're not you." That suggests a memory is only you if you relive it. But, of course, most memories aren't really relived—they don't happen again. By this logic, memories don't necessarily make you who you are…which is an idea that The Bourne Identity seems to endorse, at least in parts.