The Whereabouts of Eneas McNulty

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I was not completely convinced or surrendered to this mystical space in this one – and that may be because the same kind of almost unsettling of reality, for the reader, is done so splendidly in another, later book – 2023’s Old God’s Time. Tim from New York City: How many people in Southern Ireland really went and fought in WWI? Did you research this type of thing? Unfortunately the Twentieth century was never that kind of time, and, Ireland was never that place. There are the European Wars and there are Irelands struggles which followed hard on the heels of the First War Like Sebastian Barry’s other book that I read, “Days Without End,” I had trouble comprehending the dense prose, including the Irish slang, strange idioms, arcane vocabulary, and cryptic expressions. My reading progress was glacially slow until I realized I was reading epic poetry parading as prose.

Besides the violence and political turmoil, Ireland was also experiencing an economic depression and jobs were hard to come by. As Eneas searched for employment without any success his father suggested that he join the Royal Irish Constabulary, which was the English-led police force. There are similarities between the whereabouts of Eneas McNulty and The Secret Scripture. The Character of Roseanne comes into play in both novels which I really found intriguing. This excavation of his own family history to underpin his stories is not without its risks. His play, Our Lady of Sligo, based on tales his mother told him of his grandmother's life, utterly incensed his grandfather. 'He summoned me and asked me how I knew all these things,' says Barry, grimacing now at the memory. 'Then he cursed me and told me he would never speak to me again. He's gone now but he was as good as his word.' Magnificent…No one who loves fiction will want to reach the end of this bewitching, penetrating, unforgettable book.”— San Francisco Chronicle Book ReviewEneas is dogged throughout his life by the collapse of his friendship with Jonno Lynch and the fallout that accompanies it. How does their relationship change throughout the course of the story? In what ways does it remain constant? How does their relationship fit or defy our conventional notions of a hero/villain relationship?

Bryan Sullivan from Denver, CO: Are there many autobiographical elements to the character of Eneas? Mike from [email protected]: Do you switch your novels any when writing to an American audience? How much do your books vary in Irish form versus American? THE WHEREABOUTS OF ENEAS MCNULTY by Sebastian Barry #bookreview https://wp.me/p2ZHJe-6aU via @SandraDanby

Roseanne, Eneas’s sister-in-law, is a mysterious character with whom Eneas seems to share a deep but elusive connection. What does she represent in the story, and what does her relationship with Eneas tell us about him? The clothes one wears, and the people who produce them, are important concepts in the book. There are vivid descriptions of men in dark coats; Eneas's father is a tailor by trade; and much is made of the blue suit that Eneas dons late in the story. How does the author's use of the clothing motif contribute to our understanding of the characters, and the changes some of them undergo? It is in these ruins, he explains, that he found Roseanne, who is based somewhat tangentially on one of his great aunts, who similarly disappeared into an institution, having somehow transgressed the rigid codes of Catholic Ireland. In one way, The Secret Scripture is a final breaking of the long familial silence that enshrouded her. 'I once heard my grandfather say that she was no good,' says Barry. 'That's what survives and the rumours of her beauty. She was nameless, fateless, unknown. I felt I was almost duty-bound as a novelist to reclaim her and, indeed, remake her.'

[email protected] from xx: Did you come across any cases similar to Eneas' situation prior to writing or while writing this novel? Roseanne, Eneas's sister-in-law, is a mysterious character with whom Eneas seems to share a deep but elusive connection. What does she represent in the story, and what does her relationship with Eneas tell us about him?

Sebastian Barry: Out there somewhere in the dark and bright of the world there is a whole raft, a scattered tribe of men like Eneas, I am sure, from the twenties right up to the present. God give them quiet sleep. and were respected. People with your own face' -- and his father's neat fingertips touch the top of his head -- `that sent butter down the fiver and out into the wide ocean to Spain and Portugal where cows are scarce.' Sebastian Barry uses the language with great imagination but never overwrites. This book is a wonderful gift, in every sense.” —The Washington Post As the reader follows the hapless Eneas, there are glimmers of hope but also a terrible feeling of inevitability about the ending. You live this exile’s life with him and feel his quiet anguish. And what more could a reader want from an author than be allowed to immerse themselves in a character? Barry is undoubtedly an astute chronicler of the human condition.

Barry, a dapper dresser who looks like he might be related to WB Yeats, is a great interviewee. He tends to talk as he writes, in sentences full of beautiful imagery. 'History,' he says, 'has always seemed to me to be an intoxication of facts and it is in the ever-present ruins of history that I work.' Barry's sweet, lyrical pitch never falters; the novel has a bold measure of old-fashioned blessedness. . . .Barry vividly creates Eneas' warm humanity. . . .[his] happy childhood provides a momentary glimpse at the stark, troubling contours of Ireland's somber history.A violent surfacing of adolescence (which has little in common with Tarkington's earlier, broadly comic, Seventeen) has a compulsive impact.