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4.15 AVERAGE
4.15 AVERAGE
“I’m just thinking that would be pleasant. To be reading, say, out of a book, and you to come up and touch me – my neck, say, or my knee – and I’d carry on reading, I might let a smile, no more, wouldn’t lose my place on the page. It would be pleasant to come to that. We’d come so close, do you see, that I wouldn’t be surprised out of myself every time you touched.”
I wanted to start 2025 off with a familiar favorite and this was one that I knew I wanted to return to, but haven’t for some time. My first tattoo was a quote from At Swim, Two Boys by Jamie O’Neill so needless to say this book has a special place in my heart. The novel takes place in the year preceding the Easter Uprising of 1916. Jim Mack is a naïve young student, under the thumb of his aspiring shopkeeper father. Doyler Doyle is rebellious and boisterous, the son of Mr. Mack's old army pal. Jim and Doyler grow close and make a pact. Doyler will teach Jim how to swim and in a year's time with they will make the swim from Forty Foot, a rock where men gather to bathe in the nude, to the distant island of Muglins Rock. Over the course of the year, both the boys and their home (Ireland) undergo great changes, leaving them yearning for freedom of heart and freedom from British rule.
O'Neill wrote At Swim, Two Boys in a stream-of-consciousness style of prose. I somehow had forgotten how challenging this book can be to read, very reminiscent of James Joyce, which is of course appropriate. Once I had acclimated myself to O'Neill's writing, however, I found myself drowning in the beauty of it. It really is sort of spectacular to read, even if it does at times feel as if you have to do a bit of work for the end result. I was once again impressed with how animated some of O’Neill’s characters were. Aunt Sawney and Mr. Mack are two characters who leave very distinct impressions. The book also has a lot to say about politics, class division, religion, and philosophy but it’s all woven together so seamlessly that the ideas expressed (particularly through MacMurrough) feel natural in the text.
“It was true what Jim said, this wasn’t the end but the beginning. But the wars would end one day and Jim would come then, to the island they would share. One day surely the wars would end, and Jim would come home, if only to lie broken in MacMurrough’s arms, he would come to his island home. And MacMurrough would have it built for him, brick by brick, washed by the rain and the reckless sea. In the living stream they’d swim a season. For maybe it was true that no man is an island: but he believed that two very well might be.”
MacMurrough is a character that I really reconsidered during my reading. The first time I read At Swim, Two Boys was well over a decade ago and I was so fixated on his flaws (and the connection between Doyler and Jim) that I really detested his character. I was much more sympathetic with this experience. Yes, MacMurrough does some quite questionable things, especially in the early portions of the novel, but he’s also very much a broken man still trying to create some level of good in the world (especially in his “counseling” of Doyler and Jim.) Morally gray? Absolutely. But also kind and devastating. Reflecting on his character’s experiences and the men like Oscar Wilde who faced such harsh sentences (and the people who still experience this) is heartbreaking.
It was nice to revisit this book and see that it still has the power to move me to tears. O’Neill created so many little tender moments, brimming with humanity, that really made me fell deeply in love with Jim and Doyler all over again. Pal o’ me heart. Something that I hadn’t really considered the first I read this book is that Jim and Doyler, although part of this beautiful love story, don’t actually spend that much time together during the novel. Their love is sort of isolated to these really great scenes. Being queer is often a very isolating experience in a world that doesn’t always feel built for you, and I can’t fathom how much more difficult that must been a century ago. I this this is beautifully reflected in At Swim, Two Boys.
This is one of the greatest books I've ever read. Also, it is so much about the Ireland, without ever feeling heavy-handed, that it reads like nostalgia if you've ever lived there.
Fantastic. Truly heart-wrenching and utterly beautiful. This is a magnificent descent into the complexity and depth of the human emotional range.
“He slept that night thinking of loves and lighthouses. That one love might shine to bring all loves home.”
Good, but not great. I became a bit bored. Good, well-developed characters drive the plot.
emotional
reflective
slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
I was happy to read a coming-of-age/coming out story with a historical Context. O'Neill writes with complexity and beauty that made the book good, but not the type of read I could do on the subway or anywhere with distractions.
It had been sitting on my shelf to read, and I am glad I finally picked it up.
It had been sitting on my shelf to read, and I am glad I finally picked it up.
This book is a tour de force.
Jamie O'Neill's writing style is singular, and captures the Irish dialect(s) excellently. Such wonderful expressions, turns of phrase, character interactions and dialogues. He really deep-dived into Hiberno-English and made no attempts at pandering to a non-Irish audience, and I really admire him for it. Although, at that, I will admit that more than once I had to interrupt my reading to either look up or ponder the meaning of a particular word or phrase; personally, this enhanced the reading experience, as it meant I couldn't speed through this, as is my wont.
Reading this made me feel like I sojourned in 1915/16 Ireland, where homosexuality was illegal and taboo, where the British still had Ireland under their thumb, where poverty was rife, where almost everyone struggled with the idea of what it meant to be Irish and how to keep Irishness alive, and where some saw no alternative other than to rise up and fight for what they believed in.
This is a long book. And a slow burn. And a beautiful story.
I will say, however, that it didn't quite get 5 stars from me because I did find it a tad more slow-paced than was necessary in parts, while it glossed over some, arguably, more important moments. Nevertheless, well worth picking up!
Jamie O'Neill's writing style is singular, and captures the Irish dialect(s) excellently. Such wonderful expressions, turns of phrase, character interactions and dialogues. He really deep-dived into Hiberno-English and made no attempts at pandering to a non-Irish audience, and I really admire him for it. Although, at that, I will admit that more than once I had to interrupt my reading to either look up or ponder the meaning of a particular word or phrase; personally, this enhanced the reading experience, as it meant I couldn't speed through this, as is my wont.
Reading this made me feel like I sojourned in 1915/16 Ireland, where homosexuality was illegal and taboo, where the British still had Ireland under their thumb, where poverty was rife, where almost everyone struggled with the idea of what it meant to be Irish and how to keep Irishness alive, and where some saw no alternative other than to rise up and fight for what they believed in.
This is a long book. And a slow burn. And a beautiful story.
I will say, however, that it didn't quite get 5 stars from me because I did find it a tad more slow-paced than was necessary in parts, while it glossed over some, arguably, more important moments. Nevertheless, well worth picking up!
A very impressive novel. It beautifully tells the story of two boys, Jim and Doyler, growing up in the Ireland of 1915/1916, exploring who they are and their attraction to each other. It took me a little getting into, especially because of the language, but after that I was sold and enjoyed every page of it - the descriptions of love and feelings are superb and the ending is one that will remain in my head after having finished the book.
enjoyable, but got tired of getting to know new characters half way through.