Love Quotes in The Bourne Identity

This is the moment when Marie starts to fall in love with Bourne. Bourne killed her rapist and saved her life. Now, overall, this seems like not such a great reason for falling in love. Certainly, if someone saves your life, you should be grateful. But the way the novel is set up, Marie's love seems almost like an obligation; the hero saves, so the princess must love. On the other hand, maybe it's true that Marie sees Bourne more clearly than anyone else, Bourne himself included, and that though irrational, her love is real. Since when is love rational, anyway? Marie's going to be tough to figure out all the way to the end of the novel, so get used to questioning what's going on in her head.

It's interesting that the novel says that "All that was required was communication," without actually letting us see how that communication works. How does communication work in the novel? Does it work?

Now Marie has saved Bourne's life, too. He was injured, and she dragged him off to safety and a doctor. So the falling-in-love-out-of-gratitude is arguably mutual. These two don't have the wittiest pillow talk, but it's true that, in a way, they've already been through a lot together.

Marie tells Bourne she's willing to chuck her entire former life to run away with him. There's only one thing stopping them: Bourne needs to continue to try to figure out who he is. Even though he's an amnesiac, Bourne's past and identity are more important than Marie's. For him, love provides an ally in the quest for himself. For her, love basically erases her past accomplishments and future goals—it erases her identity, much as Bourne's identity has been erased by amnesia. What is the connection between love and identity here? Are love and amnesia similar?

A lot of the way Bourne expresses his love for Marie is by saying "I'm bad for you, baby" in one way or the other. What does this tell us about him? Is he being unfair to Marie by being in her life at all? Would Carlos express similar thoughts?

Bourne says "I'm bad for you, baby" again, and Marie tells him he's an idiot. The quip "who the hell do you think you are?" is a bit ironic, since Bourne doesn't actually know who he is. He thinks he's an assassin, which is why he feels he has to leave Marie but, of course, he's wrong. And even if he were right, it does seem a little jerky to decide for Marie who she can or can't love.

This is General Villiers, speaking of his love for his assassinated son. Villiers became a politician to carry on his son's political career after his death. Obviously, the relationship between Villiers and his son is not an instance of romantic love, but it is one of the only other instances in the book portraying any kind of love at all. (David and Gordon Webb love each other, presumably, but we never see them on the same continent, much less in the same room.)

As mentioned in the "Symbols: Fashion" discussion, Ludlum can have a surprising flare for humor. Bourne is here pretending that his wife, or mistress, is betraying him—that she is meeting her lover in church, where they are actually going to have sex. The cabbie he is speaking to is scandalized. It's a good indication of how love outside of the Bourne-Marie relationship is generally presented.

That's Marie, coming in at the end of the narrative to finish the spy story out with love, peace, and happiness. Is she just a useful plot device, or are you convinced by this ending?