This brings me to another important point in the analyzation of this text, the topic of gender and sexual identity, and how Song and Gallimard’s actions reflect those topics. Song’s attraction to Gallimard, as we learn toward the end of their twenty year “romance”, is actually much more complicated than initially thought. Song feels both ashamed, and empowered through the relationship with Gallimard, he desires to be worshipped by the Frenchman. It is not clear, however, whether Song is attracted to Gallimard’s masculine or feminine qualities. In Song’s last conversation with Rene he remarks, “…I’m disappointed in you, Rene…I thought you’d become something more. More like…a woman,” (67) expressing a desire ultimately for a woman and not a man.
