In the Time of Crisis, Who Do We Love?
By Haoran Xia
Published on: DeepFocus
June 11, 2022
Roland Barthes writes in A Lover’s Discourse: “what I have learned from love is this: that I cannot know the other. THeir obscurity does not consist in the existence of some secret concealed behind a screen, but in the fact that the play between appearance and inner truth no longer exists. Thus I am seized by a kind of rapture at loving a stranger—someone who will always remain—an inexplicable impulse—I know that I know what I do not know.”
In love, there always seems to be an unanswered riddle suspended between you and me. I want to know you, yet I am afraid of knowing you; I want to understand what you like, yet I fear that I may never be able to live up to what you desire. Every word you say, every gesture you make, appears to me as a sign that resists deciphering. They exceed my imagination. I cannot solve them, nor do I have the strength to try. But one thing I know with certainty: you constantly allow me to discover new versions of myself. It is as if I have become my own experiment, endlessly repeating the same test day after day.
And now, all of your signs—your images, your words, everything—are embedded in those chats. They live forever before my eyes, on that screen that is both tangible and unreachable, line after line rehearsing our fragmentary love.
Conversations with Friends is Sally Rooney’s debut novel, published in 2017. It tells a love story that is classical and contemporary: a modern “quadrangle.” Frances and her former girlfriend Bobbi met and fell in love in high school; after breaking up, they remain close friends. By chance, at a poetry reading, they meet Melissa, a writer, and her actor husband Nick. From that evening onward, the lives of these four people begin to ferment.
Frances falls in love with Nick and enters into an extramarital affair with him. Meanwhile, Bobbi and Melissa develop a mutual attraction of their own—exchanging glances at parties, growing intimate under the evaporating haze of martinis.
Together, the four of them seem to generate a complex yet oddly transparent universe of love: I love you, you love him, he loves her. What appears at first glance to be a clichéd, awkward, almost Qiong Yao–style melodrama turns out, in fact, to be Rooney’s precise dissection of intimacy under various conditions—during growth, before marriage, in illness, under capitalism. Like Barthes, Rooney breaks love and intimacy into a succession of fragments and places them within the vast, unbounded terrain of life itself. She boldly juxtaposes imagined love with lived love, asking whether, in the face of disaster and reality, love is merely “the unbearable lightness of being.”
As the novel’s epigraph—borrowed from Frank O’Hara—puts it: “In times of crisis, we must all decide again and again whom we love.”
Rooney dissolves the enormity of love into the blurred, borderless web of human relationships and the chat records of the electronic age, reducing it to particles that can be felt, interpreted, and transmitted as information, filling every corner of romantic experience. Though Frances serves as the primary narrator, each of the four characters articulates their own version of love. Their emotional tensions and romantic trajectories are evenly balanced. Yet in this year’s television adaptation, the four seem to have been compressed into two.
Compared with Normal People, which ignited the “Sally Rooney fever” two years ago, the television adaptation of Conversations with Friends is, ultimately, a failure.
In Normal People, we followed Connell and Marianne into their shared world. Over five years of emotional detours, we were once again asked what it means to be “you,” “me,” and “us.” Because the story consistently revolves around these two characters, they become fifty percent of one another—leaving space for each other while growing independently. Naturally, both the novel and the series remain tightly focused on their relationship: love, intimacy, and the dialogue between class positions.
Conversations with Friends, however, operates very differently. The “conversations” are shared among four people; each contributes to the record. Every argument, confession, quarrel, and phone call relies on the circulation among all four. Remove any one of them, and the quadrilateral collapses into something incomplete. Connell and Marianne are connected by countless straight lines; Frances, Bobbi, Nick, and Melissa form thousands of triangles and quadrilaterals. But when this story is transplanted onto the screen, those shapes are flattened into a single line bouncing back and forth between Frances and Nick.
This linear narrative reduces the story to a banal trope: “a literary college girl falls in love with a handsome, second-tier married actor.” The novel’s classical texture—the layered, charged confrontation among four people across class and social positions—disappears entirely. What remains is a vague coming-of-age tale and the tired refrain of “I love you, but you don’t love me enough.”
Of course, for Frances, meeting and loving Nick is a crucial episode in her growth. It is not merely an affair; it functions more like a mirror, reflecting the flaws she most wants to avoid yet cannot deny. The relationship forces her to reexamine her understanding of sex, love, intimacy, and human connection—to wipe away old stains and remake herself. Likewise, Bobbi and Melissa, the two sidelined figures, should play essential roles within this emotional storm. Yet in the series, they are reduced to detached moral arbiters: “the wounded woman” who stands above it all in judgment.
“Maybe you’re telepathic,” Marianne says.
“I used to think I could read your mind,” Connell replies.
“In bed?” she asks.
“Not just in bed. Other times too. Maybe that’s normal.”
“It is not, Connell.”
In Normal People, every line of dialogue between Connell and Marianne bristles with sharp edges. They accuse, provoke, and wound each other, yet their exchanges are suffused with compassion and regret. Once emotion is released, the barbs fall away. These conversations function like sickles, cutting through the thorns of their relationship and clearing a path toward clarity. Through extended dialogue, they gradually come to understand one another—moving from the ambiguity of “I think I know you” to the revelation of “so this is what he/she really thinks.”
Like the introspective lovers in Rohmer’s Paris, the men and women entangled in desire in Hong Sang-soo’s scripts, or Jesse and Céline wandering through time in Linklater’s trilogy, it is conversation—stretching across days and nights—that becomes the most exquisite vessel of love. Every “I” spoken aloud enters a portion of the “you.” We ramble, circle back, repeat ourselves, struggling to solve an impossible equation. And yet, through time and language working in tandem, we arrive at an optimal solution.
Although the four characters in Conversations with Friends are constantly talking, their conversations are awkward, shallow, stuck upstream, terminating at the point of pain. You don’t speak; I don’t respond. Dialogue that lacks depth and character excavation propels no one forward—not Frances, not Bobbi, not anyone. Twelve episodes pass, six hours dissolve, and they seem to have become different people. Yet at their core, they are still speaking the same old words, pondering the same romantic uncertainties.
This, of course, is not what Rooney intended.
Barely into her thirties, Rooney—like Oscar Wilde a century before her—hails from Dublin, achieved literary fame young, and leans toward socialism. A committed Marxist, Rooney is deeply invested in examining the failures and alienation produced by contemporary Western capitalism. The fractures between social classes sharpen her belief that only within the ideal society imagined by socialism might humanity approach genuine happiness.
Though many Western critics dismiss her as “a millennial observing advanced European society from the vantage point of shallow Marxism,” Rooney approaches her fiction with an almost anthropological self-awareness, scrutinizing every commodity, every action, every breath taken within modern society.
In one scene, Frances stands in a supermarket holding a can of food, suddenly realizing that its production represents the labor and time of countless people. She puts the can back and leaves, feeling that her money cannot adequately compensate that labor. This extreme sensitivity reflects Rooney’s own thinking: the world, as she imagines it, should not operate through exploitation. And perhaps it is precisely her privileged European position that forces her gaze outward—to the Eastern or Southern hemispheres—to sense the full machinery of human systems.
Born in the early 1990s, Rooney witnessed both Ireland’s economic boom and the aftershocks of the 2008 financial crisis. Nation and individual are bound together; social contexts possess the ruthless power to overturn fate at any moment. Immersed in a dim, unknowable future, agnosticism and darkness envelop every character she writes.
Her characters are not only angry at the world; they also hover at the edge of adulthood. Frances, Bobbi, Connell, Marianne—raised in safe, clean academic environments—begin to glimpse society’s fine print just as they lose control over their futures. Unable to grasp the underlying logic of sex, love, and intimacy, they confront what Alfred once called “the ultimate tests of humanity”: career, sex, and social relationships. These forces descend like avalanches, again and again, without warning, crushing them at full scale.
Thus, before every decision, Rooney’s characters lose interest. They respond with a flat “okay,” because they know—and also don’t know—what their choices and efforts mean in a world that feels like an empty game of illusions.
Isn’t this precisely the echo of today’s so-called “lying-flat generation”?
In an ongoing pandemic, our choices appear pale within a trembling, sterile society. Our voices dissolve into white noise, contributing only unsustainable negativity. Rooney once said that what makes being a millennial hardest is this: we know too much, yet can change too little. We know about economic decline. We know love is becoming cheaper. We know short videos are devouring our attention. We know that the expiration date of a PCR test defines the dimensions of freedom. And yet we persist, barely surviving in this desolate world of things—playing with one another’s emotions, numbing our nerves, flirting for distraction, pacifying hearts that have nearly lost their pulse. Neither elated by things nor saddened by ourselves, we become the “lying-flat generation.”
And yet, in both Conversations with Friends and Normal People, there is ultimately a choice. Frances comes to understand where her heart lies. Marianne lets Connell go to New York to pursue his dream. Faced with successive tragedies, they choose courage in confronting unresolved love. This ending may sound clichéd, but as Wilde once said, “Love is fed by imagination; by imagination we see life whole.”
Perhaps we are entangled in countless negative emotions. Perhaps storm clouds gather and rain pours down. But still—“in times of crisis, we must all decide again and again whom we love.”
作者：夏浩然
发表于：深焦DeepFocus
二零二二 六月十一日
罗兰·巴特在《恋人絮语》中写道：“通过爱情经历我所得到的启悟仅是：我是无法了解对方的；他的模糊并不在于存在着一个被屏障所遮掩的隐秘，而是证实表象与内在真实之间的游戏已不复存在。这样，因爱一个陌生人所产生的一阵狂喜便摄住了我——那个人将永远存在——一个莫名的冲动——我知道我所不知道的事了”。在爱情里，你和我之间仿佛永远存在着一个没有答案的谜题：我想了解你，但我又害怕了解你，我想知道你的喜好，但我又担心我无法满足你的喜爱。你的一言一行在我眼里都是一个难以解开的符号，他们几乎超出了我的所有想象力，我没办法解答，也没力气解答，但我可以确切的是，你总是让我发现新的自己，仿佛我成了我自己的试验品，每天反复无尽地做着同一个实验。到了当下，你的符号、意象、言语、一切都嵌进了那些聊天记录里，他们永远活在我眼前那个可触不可及的手机频幕中，一行又一行复述着我们碎屑般的爱情。
《聊天记录》是萨利·鲁尼出版于2017年的小说，也是她的首部长篇小说。小说描绘了一个古典又现代的“四人游”爱情故事，女主角弗朗西斯和前女友博比相识，相爱于高中，分手后仍是彼此的挚友，在一次偶然的诗歌表演上，她们结识了作家梅利莎和她的演员丈夫尼克，而这四个人的故事在那一场表演后便突然发酵。弗朗西斯爱上了尼克，并与他开始了一段了婚外情，而另一方，博比也与梅丽莎萌发暧昧情愫，她们俩在派对上眉来眼去，在马提尼的挥发下你侬我侬。
他们四个人仿佛互相催生了一个复杂而又相对透明的爱恋宇宙，我爱你，你爱他，他爱她，这看似陈腐尴尬类似琼瑶的糖水爱情，实际上，却鲁尼对于各种情境下——在成长中，在婚姻前，在病魔里，在资本下——的人际亲密关系的纯粹解剖，她将爱情和亲密关系，和巴特一样，拆解为接二连三的小碎片，放置在硕大无边的生活和生命里，大胆对比着我们想象中的爱情和现实中的爱恋，挑明了在灾难和现实前，爱情是否只是我们不可承受的生命之轻，也正如《聊天记录》题记的摘选自弗兰克·奥哈拉的那句话：“在危机时，我们都必须一次又一次地决定，我们究竟爱谁”。鲁尼将爱情这个庞大的命题化解并穿插在那模糊，漫无边界的人际关系和电子时代的聊天记录里，把它化为一颗颗可以被感觉和信息解读的分子，充盈着恋爱的角角落落。小说中的四位角色分别讲述着他们各自的爱情故事，虽然弗朗西斯为主要叙述者，但四个人的爱恋和发展各有千秋，他们相互的亲密张力和恋爱关系彼此持平，但在今年改编的剧集里，四个人的脚本似乎被压缩为两个人。
今年根据原著改编的剧集《聊天记录》与两年前掀起“萨利·鲁尼”热的《正常人》而言，是失败的。两年前,我们跟着康奈尔和玛丽安进入他们的二人世界，在长达五年的爱情迂回里，我们再次感受了什么是你，什么是我，什么是我们。因为在《正常人》里，故事始终围绕着康奈尔和玛丽安延展，他们彼此成为了对方的百分之五十，为对方留白的同时也让自己成长，剧集和小说的主题自然也紧贴两个人的故事——爱情，亲密和阶层之间的相互对白。
但在《聊天记录》里，情形则大不相同，因为构成这些聊天记录的是四个人，他们彼此分担着所有记录和对话的一部分，在每一段争辩，争吵，告白和每一通电话里他们四个人的相互往来是承载一切生发的桥梁，缺少任何一个人的存在或回音，这段四方形故事便始终拥有残缺。康奈尔和玛丽安之间存在无数条直线，而弗朗西斯，博比，尼克和梅丽莎之间拥有着成千上万种三角形和四方形的组合，当他们的故事被移花接木至剧集里时，所有三角形和四方形则变成了来回弹跳于弗朗西斯和尼克之间的单一直线。弗朗西斯和尼克之间的直线叙事让故事变成了单一的“文艺女大学生爱上二线帅气已婚男演员”的鸡毛婚外恋，而在小说中，拥有古典气息，交缠着相对复杂，让人心旌的跨越阶层和社会地位的四人交锋销声匿迹，留下的只有不明不了的成长故事和“我爱你，但你不够爱我”的陈词滥调。
当然，对于弗朗西斯而言，与尼克的相识和相爱是她成长轨迹中的一段特殊经历，这段感情不仅仅只是一段婚外恋，它更像一面镜子，照应着弗朗西斯最想躲避，也最真实的缺点，迫使她审视自己对性、爱情、亲密关系和人际关系的认知，再把过往的污渍擦掉，重新做另一个自己。同样，博比和梅丽莎这两位被排斥的局外人也应当在这婚外恋飓风中扮演一定角色，但在剧集里，她们被刻画为站在上帝角度批判一切的“那个受伤的女人”。
“或许你会读心术”玛丽安说，“我以前真的以为我可以读懂你在想什么”康奈尔答道，“你说，在床上吗？”玛丽安问到，“不仅仅是在床上，其他时候也可以，或许这挺正常的吧”“这不正常，康奈尔”。在《正常人》里，康奈尔与玛丽安的每句话都带着尖锐的刺，他们相互指责，挑衅，谩骂，言语交锋之时又带着无比的怜悯和悔恨，不过情绪被发泄，刺自然脱落，这些对话又犹如一把把镰刀，砍掉他们爱情中的荆棘，迎来的是通透的彼岸，玛丽安和康奈尔在一段又一段长对话里，逐渐了解彼此，读懂对方的内心，从一个“我感觉我了解你”的模凌两可深入至“原来他/她是这么想的”的恍然大悟。
正如侯麦电影里自省温柔的巴黎男女，洪常秀脚本里纠葛于暧昧和爱情的男男女女，以及林克莱特三部曲里的杰西和塞林，穿越白天黑夜的对话才是他们爱恋最精致的载体，每一个“我”说出口的字都走进了一部分的“你”，我们絮絮叨叨，颠来倒去，尽力完成一道难以解开的方程式，但在时间和话语的双向附丽下，我们最终找到了最优方程解。虽然《聊天记录》里四位角色时时刻刻都处于对话模式，但他们的对话尴尬，浅薄，停留在上游，终止在疼痛点，你不言我也不答。匮乏深度和人物解剖的对话并没有推进弗朗西斯或者博比或者其他任何角色，十二集过去，六小时流失，他们硬生生地成为了另外一个人，但他们的内核仍然说着从前的话，思忖着同样的恋爱疑惑。
这当然不是鲁尼想通过小说所体现的情节。刚过而立之年的鲁尼，和一百年前的王尔德，都来自都柏林，都于年轻之时闻名文学界，也都是具有社会主义倾向的作家。鲁尼是一名马克思主义拥护者，她热衷讨论当下西方社会资本主义的无力和分离，多重阶层之间的脱落让她清醒意识到，或许在社会主义者构想的那个理想社会，人类才有可能拥有终极幸福。虽然不少西方书评人抨击鲁尼为“站在浅显马克思主义之上观望先进欧洲社会的千禧年轻人”，她在小说里，用大篇章的，人类学般的自省意识思忖着当今人类社会中的每一件商品，每一个行为，和每个人的一呼一吸。
在书中，一次，弗朗斯西在超市里挑选着罐头，但突然她意识到这一个罐头的生产等于无数人的劳动和时间，她便放下了罐头，索然离开，觉得自己的金钱付不起那些劳动。这种极端的思考正凸显了鲁尼自己的思想，在她眼里，或者说在她的脑海里，这个世界的运作方式不应该呈剥削与被剥削的状态，而正是因为她处于优越的欧洲环境，才迫使她把眼光放在更遥远的东半球或南半球，感受当下人类的所有运作模式。出生于90年代初期的鲁尼，经历了爱尔兰前期的经济辉煌也遭遇了2008年金融危机的余震，国家与个人一体，社会语境拥有随时颠覆命运的无情能力，当她身处于灰暗的未来环境里时，不可知论的黑暗便包裹了她笔下的每一个角色。
她的角色不仅对世界愤懑不平，也挣扎在彻底成年的边缘，比如弗朗西斯、博比、康奈尔和玛丽安，他们在安全干净的校园环境里了解到社会的细枝末节，在逐渐丧失对未来的把控力的同时，看不清性、爱情和亲密的底层逻辑，阿弗雷德曾说“职业、性和社交关系是对人类的终极考验”，这三个裹挟社会和个人的难题，仿佛三场雪崩，一次又一次，不限时间，不限地点，以最大形式碾压着他们。所以在每一个抉择前，鲁尼笔下的人物都失去了兴趣，通常以一句平淡的“好吧”随意带过，因为他们知道，又似乎不知道，在这个万事如空花游戏的世界里，他们的选择或努力究竟意味着什么。
等等，这不回音了当下所谓的“躺平的一代”吗？在正在进行时的疫情时代里，我们的选择在动荡不安的白色社会里也显得苍白无力，我们的声音犹如白色噪音，只能给社会带来消极的不可持续。鲁尼说作为千禧一代最难的是，我们知道的太多，但我能改变的却太少。我们知道经济的衰退，知道爱情逐渐廉价，知道短视频逐渐吞噬大脑，也知道核酸的赏味期限意味着自由的维度，但我们却仍然苟活于惨淡的万物世界之中，玩弄彼此感受的同时，麻痹着自己的神经，调戏着周遭环境从中作乐，安抚着逐渐失去脉搏的心脏，不以物喜，不以己悲，做着“躺平的一代”。
不过无论是在《聊天记录》里还是《正常人》中，弗朗西斯最后明白了自己心之所向，玛丽安选择放手让康奈尔去纽约筑梦，他们在接二连三的悲剧前选择以勇敢面对过去缠绕未解的爱情，这一最终落点也许看似陈词滥调，但王尔德曾经也说“爱是靠想象力滋养的，通过想象力，我们能完整地看见生活本身”，或许我们被万千负面情绪缠身，也或许乌云袭来，暴雨如注，但“在危机时，我们都必须一次又一次地决定，我们究竟爱谁”。