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Barbatul de la gara
Helen alege să se mute în Knappogue, pe coasta de nord a Irlandei, pentru că vrea să picteze, iar Roger, pentru că are o pasiune: să renoveze halte dezafectate. Iar micuţa gară a satului pare făcută anume pentru el.
Helen e singură după ce unul din numeroasele atentate ce însângerează Irlanda îi răpeşte soţul, care nu a înţeles-o şi nu a ştiut să-i câştige inima. Viaţa ei monotonă e întreruptă din când în când de scurtele apariţii neliniştitoare ale fiului ei Jack, student la Trinity College. Roger este singur şi mutilat după ce a luptat în cel mai crud război al secolului XX. Amândoi vor să fugă de o viaţă şi o lume cărora nu le mai văd rostul.
Întâlnirea lor va fi începutul unui lung şi uneori dureros proces de reacomodare cu normalitatea – atât de bizară pentru ei – a unei relaţii pline de dragoste şi înţelegere. Însă cei care renunţă la armura indiferenţei devin vulnerabili, iar Helen va afla ce înseamnă adevărata singurătate.
Romanul "Bărbatul de la gară" a fost ecranizat în 1992 de Michael Whyte, avându-i ca protagonişti pe Julie Christie şi Donald Sutherland.
Helen e singură după ce unul din numeroasele atentate ce însângerează Irlanda îi răpeşte soţul, care nu a înţeles-o şi nu a ştiut să-i câştige inima. Viaţa ei monotonă e întreruptă din când în când de scurtele apariţii neliniştitoare ale fiului ei Jack, student la Trinity College. Roger este singur şi mutilat după ce a luptat în cel mai crud război al secolului XX. Amândoi vor să fugă de o viaţă şi o lume cărora nu le mai văd rostul.
Întâlnirea lor va fi începutul unui lung şi uneori dureros proces de reacomodare cu normalitatea – atât de bizară pentru ei – a unei relaţii pline de dragoste şi înţelegere. Însă cei care renunţă la armura indiferenţei devin vulnerabili, iar Helen va afla ce înseamnă adevărata singurătate.
Romanul "Bărbatul de la gară" a fost ecranizat în 1992 de Michael Whyte, avându-i ca protagonişti pe Julie Christie şi Donald Sutherland.
232 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1984
17 people are currently reading
240 people want to read
About the author
Jennifer Johnston
40 books100 followersLibrarian Note: There is more than one author in the GoodReads database with this name. See this thread for more information.
Jennifer Johnston was an Irish novelist. She won a number of awards, including the Whitbread Book Award for The Old Jest in 1979 and a Lifetime Achievement from the Irish Book Awards (2012). The Old Jest, a novel about the Irish War of Independence, was later made into a film called The Dawning, starring Anthony Hopkins, produced by Sarah Lawson and directed by Robert Knights.
Jennifer Johnston was an Irish novelist. She won a number of awards, including the Whitbread Book Award for The Old Jest in 1979 and a Lifetime Achievement from the Irish Book Awards (2012). The Old Jest, a novel about the Irish War of Independence, was later made into a film called The Dawning, starring Anthony Hopkins, produced by Sarah Lawson and directed by Robert Knights.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 32 reviews
September 19, 2019
4.5 stars
This is the first time I have read anything by Jennifer Johnston; she is a good writer and I should have read her before now. Johnston is Irish, born in Dublin and so, as you would expect The Troubles are a theme she works and reworks in a number of her novels. There is a good deal to interest in this novel, despite the fact it may seem at first quite slight. It is, in fact a romance, but between two protagonists in their 50s (I know, I’m in my 50s, but that isn’t the reason I read it!), both of whom have suffered significant losses. Helen is an artist who has moved to a remote seaside cottage since her husband was shot dead by the IRA, mistaken for someone else. Roger is English, a war hero who lost an arm and an eye at Arnhem. He has bought an old railway station and signal box, which he is restoring with the help of local lad Damian Sweeney. He has fled from his family who feel his mental health is unstable and want him locked away somewhere. The other main character is Helen’s son Jack who is studying in Dublin, but mixing with members of the republican movement.
On the surface the main theme of the book is the relationship between Roger and Helen, but the romance part of it occupies only the last third and even then Helen strongly resists any possibility of commitment, wanting her own space. Helen espouses an individualism which says that the received wisdom that marriage is the best fulfilment for women is wrong. The whole is very much bound up in the landscape of the remote west of Ireland, which is almost the most significant character in the book.
There is, underlying all this, a sense of division; despite what appears a serene surface there is menace underneath, which only surfaces at the shocking and explosive finale of the novel. Peace and tranquillity are transfigured by violence.
At the beginning of the book Helen sets the tone;
“Isolation.
Such a grandiose word.
Insulation.
There was the connection in the dictionary staring me in the eye”
Helen has isolated herself deliberately and tried to insulate herself from what is going on around her; not really seeing what is happening around her, even to her son. Johnston emphasises all this with the way she tells the story. The first and last chapters are told in the first person, but for the bulk of the novel the third person is used and this makes Helen seem more detached.
The whole is a delicately balanced novel; something of a rural/seaside idyll, with a background of The Troubles (under the surface all the time), a fragile and unlikely romance and a strong and interesting main character in Helen. The reader knows something is coming at the end, as a number of threads begin to wind together. There is a 1990s film starring Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland. A well-crafted novel with many layers.
This is the first time I have read anything by Jennifer Johnston; she is a good writer and I should have read her before now. Johnston is Irish, born in Dublin and so, as you would expect The Troubles are a theme she works and reworks in a number of her novels. There is a good deal to interest in this novel, despite the fact it may seem at first quite slight. It is, in fact a romance, but between two protagonists in their 50s (I know, I’m in my 50s, but that isn’t the reason I read it!), both of whom have suffered significant losses. Helen is an artist who has moved to a remote seaside cottage since her husband was shot dead by the IRA, mistaken for someone else. Roger is English, a war hero who lost an arm and an eye at Arnhem. He has bought an old railway station and signal box, which he is restoring with the help of local lad Damian Sweeney. He has fled from his family who feel his mental health is unstable and want him locked away somewhere. The other main character is Helen’s son Jack who is studying in Dublin, but mixing with members of the republican movement.
On the surface the main theme of the book is the relationship between Roger and Helen, but the romance part of it occupies only the last third and even then Helen strongly resists any possibility of commitment, wanting her own space. Helen espouses an individualism which says that the received wisdom that marriage is the best fulfilment for women is wrong. The whole is very much bound up in the landscape of the remote west of Ireland, which is almost the most significant character in the book.
There is, underlying all this, a sense of division; despite what appears a serene surface there is menace underneath, which only surfaces at the shocking and explosive finale of the novel. Peace and tranquillity are transfigured by violence.
At the beginning of the book Helen sets the tone;
“Isolation.
Such a grandiose word.
Insulation.
There was the connection in the dictionary staring me in the eye”
Helen has isolated herself deliberately and tried to insulate herself from what is going on around her; not really seeing what is happening around her, even to her son. Johnston emphasises all this with the way she tells the story. The first and last chapters are told in the first person, but for the bulk of the novel the third person is used and this makes Helen seem more detached.
The whole is a delicately balanced novel; something of a rural/seaside idyll, with a background of The Troubles (under the surface all the time), a fragile and unlikely romance and a strong and interesting main character in Helen. The reader knows something is coming at the end, as a number of threads begin to wind together. There is a 1990s film starring Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland. A well-crafted novel with many layers.
April 17, 2021
The Railway Station Man by the contemporary Irish novelist Jennifer Johnston, pushed all the right buttons for me.
Absolutely brilliant dialogue is reason alone to read the book. What characters say to each other is perfect, real, authentic. Before even considering what I thought of the plot, I knew I had to give the book at least four stars.
You are told at the start that four people will die. Who and why is made clear in the story.
Now I will explain what elements make the tale special for me.
The setting. Put yourself on the windblown northwest coast of Ireland. Breathe the salty air and feel the wind on your cheek. Foghorns moan. Lighthouse signals flash as they are swallowed up in smoky purple mist. With the wind from the west, water spouts forth from a rock fissure to shoot up into the sky. In the story is described the “Devil’s Well”, more appropriately named the “Devil’s Spout”.
A love story, drawn realistically--between two who are no longer young anymore. Life has worn them down, left visible, physical marks on them. They are emotionally and physically bruised individuals. One is an artist. The other is the eponymous “Railway Man.” One has a son to deal with. The other has a family who disapproves of all that he does. Both are loners, but for different reasons. The artist’s husband was mistakenly shot dead. The year is 1979 / 1980. Ireland is in the grip of “The Troubles.” Can a relationship between the two survive?
History told through the lives of those living it. This is how I like history told. How do historical events play out in people’s lives? This is what is delivered here. “The Troubles” and the 1944 Battle of Arnhem leave indelible marks on the two central characters. Roger Hawthorne, the “Railway Man,” has only one arm and one eye. His face is scarred, and Second World War experiences have left scars on his psyche too.
Art. Helen is the artist. She is fifty. She is chased by memories of a husband she did not love. Art is her escape valve. She completes a suite of four paintings. Together they tell a tale. The first is of a naked man standing alone on a beach. In the last, the man is gone--there remains only a pile of clothes, the sand, the sky and the waves. Although described only in words, the paintings spoke to me.
The dialogues are best experienced through the telling of the tale. I have extracted here simply a few lines. They give a prospective reader a clue to what lies in store:
Question: “Is it possible to enjoy loving?”
Response: “Yes, I think it is.”
“Leave the past alone. That will be your freedom.”
“Anger is a very healthy emotion.”
“I want to own myself.”
“Marriage isn’t a cure for loneliness.”
“I am not lonely, just alone.”
Terry Donnelly narrates the audiobook very well. Her intonations match extremely well the characters. It is this that makes the narration better than good. You hear if the person speaking is young or elderly, male or female, English or Irish. When a character sings, it is not supposed to sound as if that person were on stage. The singing is offkey, as it should be. Four or five stars for the narration? It is very heard to choose.
I have difficulty choosing between four or five stars for the book too. The story is very well told. There is not a thing I would change. I don’t think I would make the same choices as Helen, but I understand why she makes the choices she makes, and I love her art, share her fondness for the sea and agree that being alone does not mean one is lonely.
I have settled on four for both the book and the narration.
************************
*The Railway Station Man 4 stars
*The Captains and the Kings 4 stars
*Shadows on our Skin 4 stars
Absolutely brilliant dialogue is reason alone to read the book. What characters say to each other is perfect, real, authentic. Before even considering what I thought of the plot, I knew I had to give the book at least four stars.
You are told at the start that four people will die. Who and why is made clear in the story.
Now I will explain what elements make the tale special for me.
The setting. Put yourself on the windblown northwest coast of Ireland. Breathe the salty air and feel the wind on your cheek. Foghorns moan. Lighthouse signals flash as they are swallowed up in smoky purple mist. With the wind from the west, water spouts forth from a rock fissure to shoot up into the sky. In the story is described the “Devil’s Well”, more appropriately named the “Devil’s Spout”.
A love story, drawn realistically--between two who are no longer young anymore. Life has worn them down, left visible, physical marks on them. They are emotionally and physically bruised individuals. One is an artist. The other is the eponymous “Railway Man.” One has a son to deal with. The other has a family who disapproves of all that he does. Both are loners, but for different reasons. The artist’s husband was mistakenly shot dead. The year is 1979 / 1980. Ireland is in the grip of “The Troubles.” Can a relationship between the two survive?
History told through the lives of those living it. This is how I like history told. How do historical events play out in people’s lives? This is what is delivered here. “The Troubles” and the 1944 Battle of Arnhem leave indelible marks on the two central characters. Roger Hawthorne, the “Railway Man,” has only one arm and one eye. His face is scarred, and Second World War experiences have left scars on his psyche too.
Art. Helen is the artist. She is fifty. She is chased by memories of a husband she did not love. Art is her escape valve. She completes a suite of four paintings. Together they tell a tale. The first is of a naked man standing alone on a beach. In the last, the man is gone--there remains only a pile of clothes, the sand, the sky and the waves. Although described only in words, the paintings spoke to me.
The dialogues are best experienced through the telling of the tale. I have extracted here simply a few lines. They give a prospective reader a clue to what lies in store:
Question: “Is it possible to enjoy loving?”
Response: “Yes, I think it is.”
“Leave the past alone. That will be your freedom.”
“Anger is a very healthy emotion.”
“I want to own myself.”
“Marriage isn’t a cure for loneliness.”
“I am not lonely, just alone.”
Terry Donnelly narrates the audiobook very well. Her intonations match extremely well the characters. It is this that makes the narration better than good. You hear if the person speaking is young or elderly, male or female, English or Irish. When a character sings, it is not supposed to sound as if that person were on stage. The singing is offkey, as it should be. Four or five stars for the narration? It is very heard to choose.
I have difficulty choosing between four or five stars for the book too. The story is very well told. There is not a thing I would change. I don’t think I would make the same choices as Helen, but I understand why she makes the choices she makes, and I love her art, share her fondness for the sea and agree that being alone does not mean one is lonely.
I have settled on four for both the book and the narration.
************************
*The Railway Station Man 4 stars
*The Captains and the Kings 4 stars
*Shadows on our Skin 4 stars
November 12, 2020
I've been a fan of Jennifer Johnston's writing since I read her novel "Shadows on our skin" back in 2014. Since then I've tried to read one of her books every year.
I've chosen "The railway station man" as my first read of the 2018 Reading Ireland challenge. Originally published in 1984, it was republished in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
This is a slow-paced, brilliantly written novel about a 50 year-old woman who has seen a lot of tragedy in her life. Helen Cuffe is solitary by choice. She lives on the West Coast of Ireland on a hillside overlooking the sea. She divides her time between her cottage, and the 'studio/shed' out back where she does her painting.
"I'm not lonely you know, just alone. I like to live on the edge of things."
Accompanied only by 'the cat', she often spends her days in her dressing gown, smoking copiously. She does not name him - she calls him 'cat' and they have a love-hate relationship - though they seem to understand each other. Cat liked to sleep in Helen's bed like a human being with his head on the pillow. Also, he like to walk on the kitchen table and eat the butter out of the dish.
"Your cat? She nodded. "Well... really I'm his human being. You know what cats are like."
On the same hillside as Helen's cottage is a derelict railway station. Uninhabited, the building and the accompanying signal box and storage barn remain grim reminders of four men who died there.
Helen was once married. Her husband, Daniel Cuffe, a mathematics teacher, was shot in 1975 during 'The troubles'. They had two children. Jack who thrived, and a little girl who died in infancy.
"It is a curious reflection on more than twenty years of marriage that all I remember with clarity was the ending of it."
Peculiarly, Helen felt no sense of true loss when her husband was killed. Instead she felt a feeling of relief, of liberation. She acknowledges that she 'should' feel guilty for feeling this way - instead she decided that there was no point in guilt. Instead, she moves from Derry to her hillside cottage on the West coast. She paints - she talks to herself.
"It's strange how one person's words sound so loud in an empty room. They resound, unlike a conversation which seems to become absorbed by the surrounding objects."
Helen is not close to her son Jack. He is quite fond of his paternal grandmother and lives in Dublin with her whilst he attends Trinity College. A very clever young man, he visits his mother only sporadically, and seems disapproving of her lifestyle.
"I think there are so many things inside each of us that we don't want to say, and that other people don't want to hear."
Helen's story is told, by her, with memory flashbacks of the year that an Englishman bought the derelict railway station intending to bring the station back to life. Seriously injured during the 'war', Roger Hawthorne has only one arm, and one eye. He hires a local lad to help him 'do up' the station.
As the two solitary individuals Helen and Roger come to know one another, they fall in love.
"I don't want to love anybody. I don't want the burden of other people's pain. My own is enough."
Meanwhile, Jack has a very unsavory acquaintance in Dublin. He enlists Jack as a messenger for the 'Movement'..
"I mourn the needless dead."
This is a very melancholy novel. It is a testament to the superior writing skills of Jennifer Johnston that the reader, though forewarned that the story would end in tragedy, remains glued to the pages so that they can find out how it happened...
Helen is a character that I identified with. She was very 'real' to me and I don't think I will forget her anytime soon.
Highly recommended, quality literary fiction written by a master in her craft.
I purchased a Kindle copy of this novel for my own reading entertainment.
4.5 stars rounded up
I've chosen "The railway station man" as my first read of the 2018 Reading Ireland challenge. Originally published in 1984, it was republished in 2014 by Open Road Integrated Media, Inc.
This is a slow-paced, brilliantly written novel about a 50 year-old woman who has seen a lot of tragedy in her life. Helen Cuffe is solitary by choice. She lives on the West Coast of Ireland on a hillside overlooking the sea. She divides her time between her cottage, and the 'studio/shed' out back where she does her painting.
"I'm not lonely you know, just alone. I like to live on the edge of things."
Accompanied only by 'the cat', she often spends her days in her dressing gown, smoking copiously. She does not name him - she calls him 'cat' and they have a love-hate relationship - though they seem to understand each other. Cat liked to sleep in Helen's bed like a human being with his head on the pillow. Also, he like to walk on the kitchen table and eat the butter out of the dish.
"Your cat? She nodded. "Well... really I'm his human being. You know what cats are like."
On the same hillside as Helen's cottage is a derelict railway station. Uninhabited, the building and the accompanying signal box and storage barn remain grim reminders of four men who died there.
Helen was once married. Her husband, Daniel Cuffe, a mathematics teacher, was shot in 1975 during 'The troubles'. They had two children. Jack who thrived, and a little girl who died in infancy.
"It is a curious reflection on more than twenty years of marriage that all I remember with clarity was the ending of it."
Peculiarly, Helen felt no sense of true loss when her husband was killed. Instead she felt a feeling of relief, of liberation. She acknowledges that she 'should' feel guilty for feeling this way - instead she decided that there was no point in guilt. Instead, she moves from Derry to her hillside cottage on the West coast. She paints - she talks to herself.
"It's strange how one person's words sound so loud in an empty room. They resound, unlike a conversation which seems to become absorbed by the surrounding objects."
Helen is not close to her son Jack. He is quite fond of his paternal grandmother and lives in Dublin with her whilst he attends Trinity College. A very clever young man, he visits his mother only sporadically, and seems disapproving of her lifestyle.
"I think there are so many things inside each of us that we don't want to say, and that other people don't want to hear."
Helen's story is told, by her, with memory flashbacks of the year that an Englishman bought the derelict railway station intending to bring the station back to life. Seriously injured during the 'war', Roger Hawthorne has only one arm, and one eye. He hires a local lad to help him 'do up' the station.
As the two solitary individuals Helen and Roger come to know one another, they fall in love.
"I don't want to love anybody. I don't want the burden of other people's pain. My own is enough."
Meanwhile, Jack has a very unsavory acquaintance in Dublin. He enlists Jack as a messenger for the 'Movement'..
"I mourn the needless dead."
This is a very melancholy novel. It is a testament to the superior writing skills of Jennifer Johnston that the reader, though forewarned that the story would end in tragedy, remains glued to the pages so that they can find out how it happened...
Helen is a character that I identified with. She was very 'real' to me and I don't think I will forget her anytime soon.
Highly recommended, quality literary fiction written by a master in her craft.
I purchased a Kindle copy of this novel for my own reading entertainment.
4.5 stars rounded up
December 22, 2020
This was a gem of a book which I loved. Helen is a 50 year widow who after her husbands death, mistakenly killed by an IRA squad, moves from Dublin to Donegal where she hopes to rekindle her painting talent on the west coast. Her son Jack at Uni in Dublin is sympathetic to the republican cause and has found himself attached to a radical friend. Into this story then comes Richard a WW2 veteran who having lost an eye and arm in the war has escaped his family to renovate a run down signal box.
This was a beautifully told novel with some lovely prose capturing the beauty of the area and great dialogue between the parties.
I've only read one other by this other which again explored the troubles as it affects individuals and this was a book which similarly treads a fine line and could easily over romanticised this difficult subject but in its gentle depiction of Helen it proved to perfectly encapsulate the time and difficult period. If this ends up being the last book I read in 2020 it is a great way to end the year.
This was a beautifully told novel with some lovely prose capturing the beauty of the area and great dialogue between the parties.
I've only read one other by this other which again explored the troubles as it affects individuals and this was a book which similarly treads a fine line and could easily over romanticised this difficult subject but in its gentle depiction of Helen it proved to perfectly encapsulate the time and difficult period. If this ends up being the last book I read in 2020 it is a great way to end the year.
April 10, 2018
This is a slow-paced well written novel set in Ireland during the 'Troubles". The main characters are Helen, who is enjoying living alone, after her husband is shot mistakenly, and Roger, who has been badly injured in the War and is trying to resurrect the old railway station. We are told at the beginning of the 'explosion', so we know something bad is coming. Helen didn't grieve for her husband nor her baby daughter who died at birth. She has a son Jack who she doesn't see very often. She chain-smokes, crushing the cigarettes into plates. Her place is very untidy (even though she has a cleaning woman!) This smoking got to me a bit. Roger and Helen fall in love. I didn't like many of the characters except local lad Damian Sweeney. My main criticism was that it was often hard to tell who was saying what.
February 19, 2024
We' re clinging to the cliffs in Donegal where Helen has retreated to live a solitary life . Her husband is dead , accidentally shot in The Troubles , releasing her from a marriage in which she was a non active participant . Her nearly estranged son is a student in Dublin as she attempts to paint , to express her inchoate emotions .
Enter The Railway Station Man . Another loner , disfigured by an injury in an older war , living up the hill and restoring the disused hard architecture of the closed branch line .
There's a predictability in the plot , the two singular characters connecting and creativity erupting , the shadow and scars of violence never far away and the blind naive passion of Youth and The Cause an inevitable catalyst for chaos .
Johnston is best at the disconnect in dialogue , in people trying to navigate , deflect and protect their inner hurts as they feed the cat or search for cigarettes . Love is a bomb , ready to detonate at any moment .
Enter The Railway Station Man . Another loner , disfigured by an injury in an older war , living up the hill and restoring the disused hard architecture of the closed branch line .
There's a predictability in the plot , the two singular characters connecting and creativity erupting , the shadow and scars of violence never far away and the blind naive passion of Youth and The Cause an inevitable catalyst for chaos .
Johnston is best at the disconnect in dialogue , in people trying to navigate , deflect and protect their inner hurts as they feed the cat or search for cigarettes . Love is a bomb , ready to detonate at any moment .
October 24, 2012
It is in the details that Jennifer Johnston excels, the details that tell so much more because they engage the reader's imagination (something - in my opinion - the best novels always do) so that we fill in what isn't written for ourselves and understand the characters and their motives so much better, so much more vividly than if every detail was spoon-fed to us. It is just the same, I feel, in life. If there's no mystery to unravel, if every detail about another is known, then what's left? The need for a little mystery is essential because it makes us wonder and wonder makes us curious and curiosity keeps us properly alive and interested, fascinated, by the other.
In The Railway Station Man as described on Johnston's British Council page: http://literature.britishcouncil.org/... : ‘Fat Mrs O’Sullivan was running the hoover over the sitting-room floor … she wore old tennis shoes without laces as she worked, to ease the pressure on her bunions’.
You can picture her instantly, can't you?
And again this short novel (187 pages) stays long in the mind and in the heart. And again there is an ending that shocks. Brilliant.
In The Railway Station Man as described on Johnston's British Council page: http://literature.britishcouncil.org/... : ‘Fat Mrs O’Sullivan was running the hoover over the sitting-room floor … she wore old tennis shoes without laces as she worked, to ease the pressure on her bunions’.
You can picture her instantly, can't you?
And again this short novel (187 pages) stays long in the mind and in the heart. And again there is an ending that shocks. Brilliant.
March 24, 2019
A gentle yet building story about an older lady who loses her husband only to realise it was a relief. So many dutiful, loveless years for what? Helen returns to her dreams of her youth and reinvigorates her life through painting.
A disfigured war-hero, Roger, moves into the neighbour (in coastal Ireland) and follows his own absurd dream - to rebuild a decrepit train station.
Being set in a small town, the two main characters know the same people including her adult son, Jack, who is mixed up in a national fight for freedom (or perceived freedom) as well as some of her son’s peers.
The story is told from all three perspectives. Helen and Roger are quite the characters - both a bit chav and fond of the bottle but somewhat deep and intelligent.
My favourite part was the process of painting Damien, (the peer of her son) on the beach. I was hoping for some controversy even though I knew it was unlikley.
I would read this book again some time. I would recommend this to any older folks who like romance stories. I don’t think the prim and proper would appreciate the substance abuse factor.
A disfigured war-hero, Roger, moves into the neighbour (in coastal Ireland) and follows his own absurd dream - to rebuild a decrepit train station.
Being set in a small town, the two main characters know the same people including her adult son, Jack, who is mixed up in a national fight for freedom (or perceived freedom) as well as some of her son’s peers.
The story is told from all three perspectives. Helen and Roger are quite the characters - both a bit chav and fond of the bottle but somewhat deep and intelligent.
My favourite part was the process of painting Damien, (the peer of her son) on the beach. I was hoping for some controversy even though I knew it was unlikley.
I would read this book again some time. I would recommend this to any older folks who like romance stories. I don’t think the prim and proper would appreciate the substance abuse factor.
November 20, 2012
Johnston returns to the Troubles again and again, but she never writes the same story. Here, she delicately weaves a plot that requires the intersection of a number of lives. The disparate strands arrive in the same place and the braiding begins, the plait growing as the parts gently cross, diverge, and return, until the tight know at the end. For much of the book, although a reader knows something bad is going to happen, it isn't clear exactly what or exactly whom will be there when it happens. The characters engage, especially Helen and Damian, for me, although Roger, as well. Not all of the characters know what's going on, of course, and that adds to the tension, the gift of dramatic irony. I felt a twinge when Damian says he's going to build his boat in the shed. Little remarks, little decisions, and the story takes a leap, like life. And in the end, Jack behaves like a petulant child, and derails everything. A dramatic event is rendered somewhat slapstick, as a result, and the point is that this is how it happens. Sometimes with a bang and a whimper.
August 9, 2013
Rereading the first chapter I realized how carefully Johnston crafted plot and character. Even though the plot builds toward the disaster that the reader knows is coming, is fated--still the end is shocking. There are neither heroes nor sentimentality here.
March 17, 2021
I’m reacquainting myself with Jennifer Johnston. This is a great read - almost leisurely. I identified with both Helen and Roger. They are two solitary characters.
I recognised some familiar ideas/traits in her writing eg p167:
‘Oh I suppose I’d have liked to have been a writer, a painter, a poet, but I didn’t have the gift. Nothing else ever seemed worthwhile to me. That’s serious Helen. I have left no footmark on the world. Three railway stations and a whole lot of angry relations...a great legacy.’
This sentiment appeared in The Christmas Tree written one year later in 1980.
‘...I haven’t moved the world in any way. I haven’t even left a footprint on it’s surface”
The author was born in 1930 so maybe such thoughts concerned her as she entered her fifties.
It is interesting when you read several of an author’s books in close succession to note links. I also picked up on the use of the word ‘gumption’.. a great and underused word. It is used here and in The Captains and The Kings. There is the use of poetry and Shakespeare here too. Isn’t it so convenient and educational nowadays to look up all of these references?
There are some great passages that made me really pause for thought.
p176-7: ‘Time. Perhaps if we’d been young there would have been time for everything. I don’t think so. You think that all time is there before you. Lovely empty time. If you’re not very careful your past is empty time too and you have nothing to recognise yourself by. That nearly happened to me. Only a cruel accident stopped it happening to me. A cruel miracle maybe.’
And p168: ‘Mutilation is an indignity. I like to preserve what dignity I can. It’s pride, I’m afraid, Helen. Will you allow me that?’
I recognised some familiar ideas/traits in her writing eg p167:
‘Oh I suppose I’d have liked to have been a writer, a painter, a poet, but I didn’t have the gift. Nothing else ever seemed worthwhile to me. That’s serious Helen. I have left no footmark on the world. Three railway stations and a whole lot of angry relations...a great legacy.’
This sentiment appeared in The Christmas Tree written one year later in 1980.
‘...I haven’t moved the world in any way. I haven’t even left a footprint on it’s surface”
The author was born in 1930 so maybe such thoughts concerned her as she entered her fifties.
It is interesting when you read several of an author’s books in close succession to note links. I also picked up on the use of the word ‘gumption’.. a great and underused word. It is used here and in The Captains and The Kings. There is the use of poetry and Shakespeare here too. Isn’t it so convenient and educational nowadays to look up all of these references?
There are some great passages that made me really pause for thought.
p176-7: ‘Time. Perhaps if we’d been young there would have been time for everything. I don’t think so. You think that all time is there before you. Lovely empty time. If you’re not very careful your past is empty time too and you have nothing to recognise yourself by. That nearly happened to me. Only a cruel accident stopped it happening to me. A cruel miracle maybe.’
And p168: ‘Mutilation is an indignity. I like to preserve what dignity I can. It’s pride, I’m afraid, Helen. Will you allow me that?’
February 21, 2022
The main character is a widow who seeks a new life in a small coastal village in Ireland after her husband is tragically killed and finds a sort of guilty hard won happiness with her painting and her cat. Her loneliness is broken occasionally by the visits of her distant son, and eventually she finds a different sort of happiness with the eccentric war hero who has bought the local abandoned railway station with a view to restoring it. Read quite a while ago and still think of it fondly.
February 2, 2022
Dark
Sorry if i reveal anything to disuade you but this book is strange in labor and subject. No real paragraph distinctions so is easy to get confused. And the characters are unusual, troubled, leaving the book to be bit a happy read.
Sorry if i reveal anything to disuade you but this book is strange in labor and subject. No real paragraph distinctions so is easy to get confused. And the characters are unusual, troubled, leaving the book to be bit a happy read.
February 17, 2017
Humanitas fiction
February 24, 2019
- ok - sort of recommended by Marlane who read it on our girlie holiday in Majorca
January 12, 2020
The author uses such a succinct and honest style. With few words she brings her characters so readily to life.
April 7, 2023
Poignant but of its time
March 28, 2025
Brilliant. I am loving the books of this contemporary Irish writer..
August 5, 2025
3.75 stars
Lyrical but spare prose, terrific dialogue, compelling setting.
Lyrical but spare prose, terrific dialogue, compelling setting.
June 28, 2017
Helen's husband Dan has been killed in the Troubles, in error, and she has retreated to the West coast of Eire,where she has an isolated existence in a small village. The shadow of the Troubles hang over the story. She is vague, disorganised, addicted to cigarettes. Johnston portrays her inner monologue very well, as she faces the return of Jack her estranged , neo Marxist son from Trinity. Her first meeting with the railway station man, the eccentric and well off Roger Hawthorne, war injured and solitary, who is restoring the abandoned station, doesn't go well.
The growing attraction between the pair is beautifully portrayed, two lonely hearts finally meshing, but not committing. There are leitmotivs, the movie High Noon, cigarettes, the old record player, painting , as she revives her long buried aspirations as an artist.
A little slow to start , it is more a novella than a full blown novel. Firmly placed in time and setting, the lead characters are sympathetic and universal. I greatly enjoyed it years ago, and recommended it to my book group. There is also a film quite faithful , I recall.
The growing attraction between the pair is beautifully portrayed, two lonely hearts finally meshing, but not committing. There are leitmotivs, the movie High Noon, cigarettes, the old record player, painting , as she revives her long buried aspirations as an artist.
A little slow to start , it is more a novella than a full blown novel. Firmly placed in time and setting, the lead characters are sympathetic and universal. I greatly enjoyed it years ago, and recommended it to my book group. There is also a film quite faithful , I recall.
March 2, 2011
Found this at home--must have got it in a charity shop. What I call a None book. I read it because it was there. It was well written and there was some good description. However the story theme was not gripping for me and i didn`t feel a sense of loss when I finished it , like I do with some books. It will go back to the charity shop!!
February 16, 2012
Can't remember a whole lot about this book, except that my Contemporary Irish Literature Professor was a total d***. That probably dropped its rating by a star. I know Donald Sutherland goes down on Julie Christie in the film adaptation. And he has one arm.
March 28, 2015
I've read two of Johnston's novels now, and both of them have felt a little slight to me -- beautifully drawn but not quite fully realized. Still, there's just something about the way her characters look at the world that really resonates with me. And also, I identified very strongly with Helen.
April 26, 2010
Not bad. A strong ending. There is a movie version with Julie Christie and Donald Sutherland and Donnie looks like the most ridiculous person ever.
February 17, 2011
Buku bahasa Inggris pertama yang kubaca dan membuatku jatuh cinta. Wow, I love Jennifer Johnston so much!
March 3, 2012
Would have scored it a 2 1/2 star but that violates the rules.
While wading thru much of it, I found the later-part of relationship of Helen & Roger well written and enjoyable.
While wading thru much of it, I found the later-part of relationship of Helen & Roger well written and enjoyable.
October 21, 2012
Poorly edited, but masterfully crafted.
December 4, 2014
Another superb story from a consummated master of her craft.
I love the way Johnston builds her characters and though I know this will end in tragedy still the ending when it arrives shocked me.
I love the way Johnston builds her characters and though I know this will end in tragedy still the ending when it arrives shocked me.
January 6, 2016
beautifully written simple human story.
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