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The Country Girls Trilogy #1-3
The Country Girls: Three Novels and an Epilogue: (The Country Girl; The Lonely Girl; Girls in Their Married Bliss; Epilogue)
A treasure of world literature back in print, featuring a new introduction by Eimear McBride
The country girls are Caithleen “Kate” Brady and Bridget “Baba” Brennan, and their story begins in the repressive atmosphere of a small village in the west of Ireland in the years following World War II. Kate is a romantic, looking for love; Baba is a survivor. Setting out to conquer the bright lights of Dublin, they are rewarded with comical miscommunications, furtive liaisons, bad faith, bad luck, bad sex, and compromise; marrying for the wrong reasons, betraying for the wrong reasons, fighting in their separate ways against the overwhelming wave of expectations forced upon "girls" of every era.
The Country Girls Trilogy and Epilogue charts unflinchingly the pattern of women’s lives, from the high spirits of youth to the chill of middle age, from hope to despair, in remarkable prose swinging from blunt and brutal to whimsical and lyrical. It is a saga both painful and hilarious, and remains one of the major accomplishments of Edna O’Brien’s extraordinary career.
This omnibus edition includes the novels The Country Girls, The Lonely Girl, and Girls in Their Married Bliss.
546 pages, Kindle Edition
First published January 1, 1986
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About the author
Edna O'Brien
113 books1,385 followersEdna O’Brien was an award-winning Irish author of novels, plays, and short stories. She has been hailed as one of the greatest chroniclers of the female experience in the twentieth century. She was the 2011 recipient of the Frank O’Connor Prize, awarded for her short story collection Saints and Sinners. She also received, among other honors, the Irish PEN Award for Literature, the Ulysses Medal from University College Dublin, and a lifetime achievement award from the Irish Literary Academy. Her 1960 debut novel, The Country Girls, was banned in her native Ireland for its groundbreaking depictions of female sexuality. Notable works also include August Is a Wicked Month (1965), A Pagan Place (1970), Lantern Slides (1990), and The Light of Evening (2006). O’Brien lived in London until her death.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 476 reviews
June 21, 2019
Me ha gustado muchísimo, y eso que es un libro raro y a veces me ha sacado de quicio por sus personajes (a los que amas y odias con locura).
Pero ha sido un viaje maravilloso del que me quedo con la voz de Edna O'Brien, una autora con la que voy a repetir, porque tiene una fuerza y una intensidad increíble.
Esta trilogía (que recomiendo leer del tirón) narra la vida de dos amigas a lo largo de toda su vida, dos chicas "de campo" irlandesas, en plenos años 50. El libro ahonda sobre lo que suponía nacer mujer en Irlanda en esa época, en una sociedad tan machista y católica.
Es un libro muy feminista, consigue mostrar a la perfección la vida de estas mujeres cuyas vidas desde su nacimiento hasta su muerte estaban supeditadas a los deseos de los hombres.
Acabas el libro con mucha rabia, desencanto, pena. Pero es una gran lectura, que creo que me va a dejar un poso importante.
Ahora que no me venga nadie con lo de #notallmen porque MATO
Pero ha sido un viaje maravilloso del que me quedo con la voz de Edna O'Brien, una autora con la que voy a repetir, porque tiene una fuerza y una intensidad increíble.
Esta trilogía (que recomiendo leer del tirón) narra la vida de dos amigas a lo largo de toda su vida, dos chicas "de campo" irlandesas, en plenos años 50. El libro ahonda sobre lo que suponía nacer mujer en Irlanda en esa época, en una sociedad tan machista y católica.
Es un libro muy feminista, consigue mostrar a la perfección la vida de estas mujeres cuyas vidas desde su nacimiento hasta su muerte estaban supeditadas a los deseos de los hombres.
Acabas el libro con mucha rabia, desencanto, pena. Pero es una gran lectura, que creo que me va a dejar un poso importante.
Ahora que no me venga nadie con lo de #notallmen porque MATO
August 3, 2012
The smartest and most hilarious possible response to the catastrophe of being born female in the rural west of Ireland at mid-century.
The trilogy actually encompasses three books – The Country Girls, The Lonely Girl, and Girls in Their Married Bliss. They follow the highly intelligent but spacy Caithleen and her forcefully self-centered “best” friend Baba on a trajectory that huge numbers of Irish women’s lives took during those decades – from farm to convent school to Dublin and finally into London. The books make no claims, however, as to their representative status. Instead, the first two books stay scrupulously grounded in the consciousness of Caithleen, our first-person narrator, who proves a good story teller, if a bad interpreter of what precisely the story means. All sorts of men crowd themselves into the orphaned Caithleen’s life, and part of the first novel’s tension comes from the judgments the reader will inevitably make about who might help Kate out and who might do her ill: judgments Caithleen seems unable to form for herself. But by the second book we’ve been served notice that our Jane-Eyre-inflected fantasies of upward mobility skew OUR perception quite badly, and it becomes apparent what Caithleen needs the chain-smoking, good-time-grabbing, light-me-a-cigarette-will-ya Baba for. What seems like Baba’s destruction of Caithleen’s chances to “make something of herself” in the first book is decidedly revealed in the second book as a narrow escape.
I was a bit apprehensive about the third book, which abandons Caithleen’s first-person narration for chapters that, when dealing with Caithleen, are written with an elegant third-person omniscience, and when dealing with Baba, are written in Baba’s voice. The Baba chapters are among the funniest in a very funny trilogy. The Caithleen chapters are a bit sad – not just because the content is sad, but because the author can no longer imagine Caithleen speaking for herself about what it’s like to be Caithleen. At some point Edna O’Brien escaped being Caithleen by becoming a world-famous author. That she doesn’t lazily award Caithleen the same ending is to her credit. That she can only approach Caithleen from the outside, using the compensations of her own much more worldly voice to bring her near us suggests something about Caithleen – or thousands of women like her – that got lost for good.
At the very end of the trilogy, Baba finds Kate reading “a newspaper article about women who for the purpose of scientific experiment had volunteered to spend a fortnight in an underground cave. Kate read: ‘Doctors in touch by telephone from an adjacent cave continue to be astonished at the physical resilience and lively spirits of the women, who were unknown to each other before the vigil began.’” And that’s pretty much what the entire trilogy is about – listening in from another cave, and discovering that even when buried underground, smothered in dark, small spaces, women keep chattering and laughing and carrying on.
The trilogy actually encompasses three books – The Country Girls, The Lonely Girl, and Girls in Their Married Bliss. They follow the highly intelligent but spacy Caithleen and her forcefully self-centered “best” friend Baba on a trajectory that huge numbers of Irish women’s lives took during those decades – from farm to convent school to Dublin and finally into London. The books make no claims, however, as to their representative status. Instead, the first two books stay scrupulously grounded in the consciousness of Caithleen, our first-person narrator, who proves a good story teller, if a bad interpreter of what precisely the story means. All sorts of men crowd themselves into the orphaned Caithleen’s life, and part of the first novel’s tension comes from the judgments the reader will inevitably make about who might help Kate out and who might do her ill: judgments Caithleen seems unable to form for herself. But by the second book we’ve been served notice that our Jane-Eyre-inflected fantasies of upward mobility skew OUR perception quite badly, and it becomes apparent what Caithleen needs the chain-smoking, good-time-grabbing, light-me-a-cigarette-will-ya Baba for. What seems like Baba’s destruction of Caithleen’s chances to “make something of herself” in the first book is decidedly revealed in the second book as a narrow escape.
I was a bit apprehensive about the third book, which abandons Caithleen’s first-person narration for chapters that, when dealing with Caithleen, are written with an elegant third-person omniscience, and when dealing with Baba, are written in Baba’s voice. The Baba chapters are among the funniest in a very funny trilogy. The Caithleen chapters are a bit sad – not just because the content is sad, but because the author can no longer imagine Caithleen speaking for herself about what it’s like to be Caithleen. At some point Edna O’Brien escaped being Caithleen by becoming a world-famous author. That she doesn’t lazily award Caithleen the same ending is to her credit. That she can only approach Caithleen from the outside, using the compensations of her own much more worldly voice to bring her near us suggests something about Caithleen – or thousands of women like her – that got lost for good.
At the very end of the trilogy, Baba finds Kate reading “a newspaper article about women who for the purpose of scientific experiment had volunteered to spend a fortnight in an underground cave. Kate read: ‘Doctors in touch by telephone from an adjacent cave continue to be astonished at the physical resilience and lively spirits of the women, who were unknown to each other before the vigil began.’” And that’s pretty much what the entire trilogy is about – listening in from another cave, and discovering that even when buried underground, smothered in dark, small spaces, women keep chattering and laughing and carrying on.
March 24, 2018
Madre mía. Esto no es para nada lo que esperaba encontrar en esta trilogía. Esperaba un relato divertido y nostálgico, a ratos edulcorado, a ratos sarcástico, crítico con su tiempo pero a la vez con momentos tiernos. Y lo que me he encontrado es una historia crudísima que me ha dejado bastante hecha polvo al final.
Enseguida ves que las dos protagonistas están lejos de ser personajes edulcorados y "perfectos". Sus virtudes y defectos van saliendo a partes iguales y las moldean a medida que van madurando. Muchas veces estaba totalmente en desacuerdo con sus decisiones, y aún así sólo podía esperar a que las cosas al final les fueran bien. Ser mujer nunca ha sido un camino de rosas, y la Irlanda católica de los años cincuenta-sesenta no es ninguna excepción.
- Las chicas de campo: 4*
En el primer libro conocemos a Caithleen y a Baba, dos amigas con una relación bastante peculiar y con dos temperamentos bastante opuestos. Su infancia en la Irlanda rural estará marcada por sus circunstancias familiares, su personalidad, por carencias e ilusiones.
- La chica de ojos verdes: 2.5-3*:
Me ha parecido el más flojo. Las protagonistas están en el final de su adolescencia/principio de su veintena. Por desgracia, durante bastante parte del libro Baba está ausente y sólo seguimos la historia de Caithleen. Para mi, ha sido el más flojo porque creo que se recrea una y otra vez en lo mismo (la relación de Kate con un hombre casado) y creo que desaprovecha otras tramas.
- Chicas felizmente casadas: 4*
A pesar de que por lo que he visto mucha gente lo considera el más flojo de la trilogía a mi me ha parecido que la forma cómo está contada la historia en este libro es la justa para que cobre la fuerza que merece. En este libro BABA toma las riendas con capítulos contados en primera persona que se alternan con capítulos de Kate (Caithleen) en tercera (como hasta ahora). La voz de Baba es sarcástica, mordaz y cruda, y es imprescindible para contar el final de la historia de las dos amigas.
Enseguida ves que las dos protagonistas están lejos de ser personajes edulcorados y "perfectos". Sus virtudes y defectos van saliendo a partes iguales y las moldean a medida que van madurando. Muchas veces estaba totalmente en desacuerdo con sus decisiones, y aún así sólo podía esperar a que las cosas al final les fueran bien. Ser mujer nunca ha sido un camino de rosas, y la Irlanda católica de los años cincuenta-sesenta no es ninguna excepción.
- Las chicas de campo: 4*
En el primer libro conocemos a Caithleen y a Baba, dos amigas con una relación bastante peculiar y con dos temperamentos bastante opuestos. Su infancia en la Irlanda rural estará marcada por sus circunstancias familiares, su personalidad, por carencias e ilusiones.
- La chica de ojos verdes: 2.5-3*:
Me ha parecido el más flojo. Las protagonistas están en el final de su adolescencia/principio de su veintena. Por desgracia, durante bastante parte del libro Baba está ausente y sólo seguimos la historia de Caithleen. Para mi, ha sido el más flojo porque creo que se recrea una y otra vez en lo mismo (la relación de Kate con un hombre casado) y creo que desaprovecha otras tramas.
- Chicas felizmente casadas: 4*
A pesar de que por lo que he visto mucha gente lo considera el más flojo de la trilogía a mi me ha parecido que la forma cómo está contada la historia en este libro es la justa para que cobre la fuerza que merece. En este libro BABA toma las riendas con capítulos contados en primera persona que se alternan con capítulos de Kate (Caithleen) en tercera (como hasta ahora). La voz de Baba es sarcástica, mordaz y cruda, y es imprescindible para contar el final de la historia de las dos amigas.
Read
November 8, 2025There is a book called no country for old men. Enda O'Brien's trilogy (the country girls (1960), the lonely girl(1962), girls in their married bliss (1964), & an Epilogue published in 1987) is set in no country for young women, or possibly countries, first Ireland, then London, and really they are not just no countries for young women but no countries for women, unless in the case of Ireland they wear a wimple, carry rosaries, and have taken holy orders.
The series is at face value the picaresque adventures of two girls - about 14 at the start of the story; caitleen who over the course of the novels is made into Kate, and Baba (Bridget). They are not exactly friends, by the end I might say they are mutually dependant and mostly in the books friendly towards each other. They escape from the frying pan into the fire repeatedly with a sound like the jolly pop of a champagne cork from the bottle, from their childhood countryside homes, possibly in County Clare, anyhow close to the river Shannon and to Limerick where the men are drunk and violent, or aged and lecherous, the women are martyrs or quiet rebels boozing with travelling salesmen regarding the husband as a soldier of an occupying power to be detested, where teeth are brown or green or missing. Any road , pop, they escape from there to a convent school, which is not a prison, because in prison there is the possibility of early release on parole or even appealing against your sentence, but, pop, cleverly they managed to escape to the bright lights of Dublin. Here they try to have fun but eventually, pop, they really need to escape to London. Doctor Johnson observed that the man who is tired of London, is tired of life; so plainly there's no way out, save in a box, from London. Now in their early twenties they have to buckle down and accept their lives of married bliss, irony very much intended. Eventually I remembered that an Irishman observed that all women become like their mothers which is their tragedy while no man does, and that is his; unconsciously the young women have been working very hard all the while to repeat the patterns of their mothers' lives even while literally running away from them. And reader, I saw a tragedy, in three acts.
Both Cait and Baba remain naive throughout, Baba's nativity is flavoured with a very funny cynicism ( I know its an likely combination but I dont know how else to describe it ) while Cait' s nativity is of the dreamy and romantic kind, she reads and remember books, but none of them help her escape the pattern of her life. Perhaps they are part of the problem. My point of comparison is with the atom station which is the story of a country girl making her way in the big city (well, ok, Reykjavik) and having love affairs, possibly with inappropriate men. She is also pious - as Cait remains, despite Convent school, -but practical,sturdy and self posed, ignorant but not naive. The politics in is as the title implies explicit, Cait and Baba maybe can never be Political because they are relatively privileged, solidarity even with each other, let alone all other women, would require recognising their relative power in the class structure for all that, the need for Feminism is the unspoken subtext of the trilogy: the central scene of the trilogy is the fight between Cait' s awful father and her awful lover as to which of them is going to possess her.
The second volume is Gothic with Cait settlingly in to a smaller, but dustier, Mandalay somewhere outside of Dublin with a somewhat Mr de Winter / Mr Rochester / Bluebeard like man and his Mrs Danvers impersonating servant. The attraction of the man to her is that he looks sepulchrial, and reader, she marries him, that night she dreams of being entombed in a living death, and the nice thing about dreams like that is that they can come true. The husband is a toned down version of O'Brien's own husband, Baba says that he'd tell you how to breathe (certainly in the book we see him tell Cait how to do pretty much everything else and he calls her fat into the bargain, since obviously he's young love's dream .
The third volume splits the narrative between Baba and Cait who has thought herself into Kate by this stage, the tone is modern even though Baba tries to live like a lady out of the decameron, mind you her husband, an Irish builder worth a million or two, who dreams of returning to the furthest West of Ireland much to Baba's horror - the kind of man who insures that any of his workers who happen to have heard of Labour rights fall off scaffolds- is trying to live as though the year 1400 is still in the future, so why not?
I became interested in reading the trilogy a couple of years ago, my interest was sharpened by a couple of newspaper articles, one about the parties that O'Brien hosted in London (Harold Wilson was a guest, which shocked me - a British Prime Minister attending an author's party!) after her divorce, another about her ex-husband and how he would write dismissive commentaries beneath her diary entries among other acts of charm and affection. Then I read the lesser bohemians, and I'd say that Eimear McBride is reworking aspects from the Country girls trilogy in that, and a girl is a half formed thing. McBride wrote the forward to the edition that I read in which she more or less confesses to that. Luckily I was kindly given the trilogy as a Christmas present, now I glumly think that maybe I have frightened you off from reading it, but it is funny, and engaging, literary - you could play spot the book references all day I think, and it's full of drink as well as making fun of how Dubliners speak, and the fear that the person with the money might get up and have to leave the restaurant before the bill has been paid.
The series is at face value the picaresque adventures of two girls - about 14 at the start of the story; caitleen who over the course of the novels is made into Kate, and Baba (Bridget). They are not exactly friends, by the end I might say they are mutually dependant and mostly in the books friendly towards each other. They escape from the frying pan into the fire repeatedly with a sound like the jolly pop of a champagne cork from the bottle, from their childhood countryside homes, possibly in County Clare, anyhow close to the river Shannon and to Limerick where the men are drunk and violent, or aged and lecherous, the women are martyrs or quiet rebels boozing with travelling salesmen regarding the husband as a soldier of an occupying power to be detested, where teeth are brown or green or missing. Any road , pop, they escape from there to a convent school, which is not a prison, because in prison there is the possibility of early release on parole or even appealing against your sentence, but, pop, cleverly they managed to escape to the bright lights of Dublin. Here they try to have fun but eventually, pop, they really need to escape to London. Doctor Johnson observed that the man who is tired of London, is tired of life; so plainly there's no way out, save in a box, from London. Now in their early twenties they have to buckle down and accept their lives of married bliss, irony very much intended. Eventually I remembered that an Irishman observed that all women become like their mothers which is their tragedy while no man does, and that is his; unconsciously the young women have been working very hard all the while to repeat the patterns of their mothers' lives even while literally running away from them. And reader, I saw a tragedy, in three acts.
Both Cait and Baba remain naive throughout, Baba's nativity is flavoured with a very funny cynicism ( I know its an likely combination but I dont know how else to describe it ) while Cait' s nativity is of the dreamy and romantic kind, she reads and remember books, but none of them help her escape the pattern of her life. Perhaps they are part of the problem. My point of comparison is with the atom station which is the story of a country girl making her way in the big city (well, ok, Reykjavik) and having love affairs, possibly with inappropriate men. She is also pious - as Cait remains, despite Convent school, -but practical,sturdy and self posed, ignorant but not naive. The politics in is as the title implies explicit, Cait and Baba maybe can never be Political because they are relatively privileged, solidarity even with each other, let alone all other women, would require recognising their relative power in the class structure for all that, the need for Feminism is the unspoken subtext of the trilogy: the central scene of the trilogy is the fight between Cait' s awful father and her awful lover as to which of them is going to possess her.
The second volume is Gothic with Cait settlingly in to a smaller, but dustier, Mandalay somewhere outside of Dublin with a somewhat Mr de Winter / Mr Rochester / Bluebeard like man and his Mrs Danvers impersonating servant. The attraction of the man to her is that he looks sepulchrial, and reader, she marries him, that night she dreams of being entombed in a living death, and the nice thing about dreams like that is that they can come true. The husband is a toned down version of O'Brien's own husband, Baba says that he'd tell you how to breathe (certainly in the book we see him tell Cait how to do pretty much everything else and he calls her fat into the bargain, since obviously he's young love's dream .
The third volume splits the narrative between Baba and Cait who has thought herself into Kate by this stage, the tone is modern even though Baba tries to live like a lady out of the decameron, mind you her husband, an Irish builder worth a million or two, who dreams of returning to the furthest West of Ireland much to Baba's horror - the kind of man who insures that any of his workers who happen to have heard of Labour rights fall off scaffolds- is trying to live as though the year 1400 is still in the future, so why not?
I became interested in reading the trilogy a couple of years ago, my interest was sharpened by a couple of newspaper articles, one about the parties that O'Brien hosted in London (Harold Wilson was a guest, which shocked me - a British Prime Minister attending an author's party!) after her divorce, another about her ex-husband and how he would write dismissive commentaries beneath her diary entries among other acts of charm and affection. Then I read the lesser bohemians, and I'd say that Eimear McBride is reworking aspects from the Country girls trilogy in that, and a girl is a half formed thing. McBride wrote the forward to the edition that I read in which she more or less confesses to that. Luckily I was kindly given the trilogy as a Christmas present, now I glumly think that maybe I have frightened you off from reading it, but it is funny, and engaging, literary - you could play spot the book references all day I think, and it's full of drink as well as making fun of how Dubliners speak, and the fear that the person with the money might get up and have to leave the restaurant before the bill has been paid.
August 27, 2018
La publicación de la primera novela de esta trilogía, Las chicas de campo, supuso una conmoción en la sociedad irlandesa de comienzos de los años 60, hasta el punto de que el párroco de Tuamgraney, localidad de origen de la autora, consiguió tres de los cuatro ejemplares que se pusieron a la venta en Irlanda y los quemó en público.
Este hecho sin duda suscitará la curiosidad de la mayoría, pero el que espere una historia escandalosa se sentirá decepcionado. Y esa decepción sin duda dice mucho de la mentalidad de la época y la misoginia imperante en aquella sociedad ultraconservadora: al final, lo escandaloso era el reconocimiento de las ansias de libertad e independencia, de la sexualidad de las protagonistas, y no tanto otros hechos que se narran que sí son abominables.
En la primera novela conoceremos a Caithleen y a Baba, dos niñas al comenzar el libro, habitantes de una pequeña localidad rural en la Irlanda de los años 50. Compañeras de colegio, pudiera parecer que no tienen más que eso en común: Caithleen Brady es dependiente y temerosa, ama a su madre y se aferra a ella con temor, pero la pierde siendo aún niña, quedando desamparada junto a un padre alcohólico y violento. Baba Brennan es rebelde, dominante y decidida, y proviene de una familia acomodada. Ambas forjan una amistad maravillosamente descrita, compleja y real, de dependencia por parte de ambas, de amor y rechazo, siendo a la vez enemigas y aliadas.
Este primer libro es mi preferido de los tres, tanto por esos primeros pasos hacia una amistad memorable y la manera en que refleja el paso de la infancia a la adolescencia de las dos protagonistas, como por los personajes secundarios, todos perfectamente retratados, y la oprimente atmósfera religiosa, claustrofóbica, y de la que es realmente complicado escapar, pero que describe con ternura, humor incluso, sin quitarle por ello todo el horror que supone.
En La chica de ojos verdes asistimos al viaje hacia la madurez, el paso a la vida adulta, la independencia que consiguen al mudarse juntas a Dublín, las primeras relaciones, las fiestas y sus sueños, el descubrimiento de un mundo radicalmente distinto. Creo que en este segundo volumen se pierde algo del encanto.
Finalmente, en Chicas felizmente casadas, vemos ya a las protagonistas en su vida adulta, con sus sueños cumplidos (aunque, quizás, no de la manera soñada), en un cierre realista, con satisfacciones y amarguras, alegrías y desilusiones, a veces resultado de malas elecciones, que me ha supuesto un pequeño puñetazo en el estómago. Pese a que esos puñetazos suelen ser buena señal, es el volumen que menos me ha gustado. Confieso que no sé explicar del todo las razones, los cambios en la voz narradora no me han gustado, y quizás los hechos me han hecho algo de daño y me niego a admitir que yo, en contra de todos mis principios, deseaba un final algo más edulcorado.
Con todo, Las chicas de campo es una trilogía sumamente recomendable, sencilla y auténtica, que refleja de maravilla la sociedad irlandesa de la época, sociedad que Edna O’Brien sufrió en sus propias carnes, dejando reflejadas sus propias vivencias en estas páginas (de hecho, el título de su autobiografía es Chica de campo).
Este hecho sin duda suscitará la curiosidad de la mayoría, pero el que espere una historia escandalosa se sentirá decepcionado. Y esa decepción sin duda dice mucho de la mentalidad de la época y la misoginia imperante en aquella sociedad ultraconservadora: al final, lo escandaloso era el reconocimiento de las ansias de libertad e independencia, de la sexualidad de las protagonistas, y no tanto otros hechos que se narran que sí son abominables.
En la primera novela conoceremos a Caithleen y a Baba, dos niñas al comenzar el libro, habitantes de una pequeña localidad rural en la Irlanda de los años 50. Compañeras de colegio, pudiera parecer que no tienen más que eso en común: Caithleen Brady es dependiente y temerosa, ama a su madre y se aferra a ella con temor, pero la pierde siendo aún niña, quedando desamparada junto a un padre alcohólico y violento. Baba Brennan es rebelde, dominante y decidida, y proviene de una familia acomodada. Ambas forjan una amistad maravillosamente descrita, compleja y real, de dependencia por parte de ambas, de amor y rechazo, siendo a la vez enemigas y aliadas.
Este primer libro es mi preferido de los tres, tanto por esos primeros pasos hacia una amistad memorable y la manera en que refleja el paso de la infancia a la adolescencia de las dos protagonistas, como por los personajes secundarios, todos perfectamente retratados, y la oprimente atmósfera religiosa, claustrofóbica, y de la que es realmente complicado escapar, pero que describe con ternura, humor incluso, sin quitarle por ello todo el horror que supone.
En La chica de ojos verdes asistimos al viaje hacia la madurez, el paso a la vida adulta, la independencia que consiguen al mudarse juntas a Dublín, las primeras relaciones, las fiestas y sus sueños, el descubrimiento de un mundo radicalmente distinto. Creo que en este segundo volumen se pierde algo del encanto.
Finalmente, en Chicas felizmente casadas, vemos ya a las protagonistas en su vida adulta, con sus sueños cumplidos (aunque, quizás, no de la manera soñada), en un cierre realista, con satisfacciones y amarguras, alegrías y desilusiones, a veces resultado de malas elecciones, que me ha supuesto un pequeño puñetazo en el estómago. Pese a que esos puñetazos suelen ser buena señal, es el volumen que menos me ha gustado. Confieso que no sé explicar del todo las razones, los cambios en la voz narradora no me han gustado, y quizás los hechos me han hecho algo de daño y me niego a admitir que yo, en contra de todos mis principios, deseaba un final algo más edulcorado.
Con todo, Las chicas de campo es una trilogía sumamente recomendable, sencilla y auténtica, que refleja de maravilla la sociedad irlandesa de la época, sociedad que Edna O’Brien sufrió en sus propias carnes, dejando reflejadas sus propias vivencias en estas páginas (de hecho, el título de su autobiografía es Chica de campo).
August 10, 2008
Reading this trilogy was an interesting experience for me because I read the first two books, The Country Girls and The Lonely Girl, as a teenager back in the '60s. In my opinion, those two books held up very well. Kate and Baba are best friends, although Baba frequently treats Kate, the more scholarly and sensitive girl, quite unkindly. Ultimately, the girls, later women, are the constant factor in each other's lives. Searching for a life beyond their restrictive small town life and convent school, they escape to Dublin and seek happiness in their relationships with men.
By the third book, Girls in their Married Bliss, they are attempting to live with their poor choices and deal with the unhappy consequences. This book, in my opinion, is the least successful of the three. If I had read the third book as a stand-alone, I do not think that I would have enjoyed it at all. Sandwiched between Lonely Girl and the epilogue, however, it adds to the understanding of these women and the difficult lives they have chosen. I found the Epilogue to be touching and heartbreaking. I would recommend reading these books all of the way through the epilogue to obtain the complete picture that O'Brien presents of the intertwined lives of these women.
By the third book, Girls in their Married Bliss, they are attempting to live with their poor choices and deal with the unhappy consequences. This book, in my opinion, is the least successful of the three. If I had read the third book as a stand-alone, I do not think that I would have enjoyed it at all. Sandwiched between Lonely Girl and the epilogue, however, it adds to the understanding of these women and the difficult lives they have chosen. I found the Epilogue to be touching and heartbreaking. I would recommend reading these books all of the way through the epilogue to obtain the complete picture that O'Brien presents of the intertwined lives of these women.
November 20, 2008
What a roller coaster this put me on. While reading it, I was sincerely frightened for the characters and for my own fate in life, I pounded the pillow in helpless distress and needed to be comforted by Frank that, if it made me feel so much, she must be doing something right. But it was agony, not beautiful agony, but masochistic, call-your-therapist agony. The pain it induced was more than I'd bargained for. As I approached the end, I thought, this is a work I want to own, to add to my colection while is already filled in terms of shelf space. This is a book I can't forget and don't want to, like a tragic ending to the closest friendship of my life. And just an hour after finishing it, it felt as if a pillowcase that had been blinding me had been lifted. IO saw everything more clearly. How could O'Brien put me through such pain? Did she realize there was not one sympathetic male character in her entire trilogy (excepting Snowie perhaps)? Did she want women to call of romance and seek only the comfort of female friendships? Was life truly such a lost cause? Was there nothing to be gained or learned from our experiences? And now I'm left feeling deceived by her, as if I'd been caught up in a man-hating cult of abandoned women who still craved their drug.
This book was torture, good torture, then cruel torture, then unnecessary torture. I want my grounding on reality back. May no single woman in search of true companionship read this book. May no woman in a failing relationship read this, either. May no man waste his time on it. No, this book didn't end up a failure. It was sentimental, but saved by its humor, and deeply moving as only a roller coaster that has been derailed can move you.
Looking back on this destabilizing half-week experience in which I could do nothing but read this book or worry about reading on, for fear I would be further traumatized, I remember now who it was whore assured me as I cried in hopelessness or went into a panic. Yes, it was my partner, a concept that O'Brien's characters cannot fathom in this chronicle. What I'm left with is a love-hate relationship. I hate this book for torturing me as it did, but I love it for invoking such strong feelings. Thank goodness there is life outside this trilogy. If this were an accurate portrayal of human relations, I think I'd kill myself.
But my fault was in over-identifying with the literate and romantic Caithleen, even as she proceeds to lose her grip on reality. Warning: these characters are extremes. I wouldn't identify too closely with any if I could avoid it. Unfortunately, I'm not very good at dividing the literary world from the literal world.
Good luck to readers and have a supportive partner or an excellent therapist should you choose to read this. I regret recommending it to my mother.
Some lines I wanted to remember, for one reason or another (no use questioning their profundity):
"He was only a shadow now, and I remembered him the way one remembers a nice dress that one has grown out of" (p. 179, not this edition)
"I used to think of my life as a failure, purposeless . . . until I got older and became aware of things. I now know that the problem of life is not solved by success but by failure: struggle and achievement and failure, on and on" (p. 220).
"He directed documentary pictures but was always buying leisure, as if in the course of leisure he must found what he had been ordained to do" (p. 391).
"'Baba, why did you do it to me?' he said. Useless to say that I hadn't thought of him when I was doing it. Useless to say that I always thought your acquaintanceship with one person had nothing to do with another" (p. 471).
"She closed her eyes on the thought that sleeping with a man was unimportant. A nothing, if nothing in the way of love preceded it. Or resulted from it" (p. 500).
This book was torture, good torture, then cruel torture, then unnecessary torture. I want my grounding on reality back. May no single woman in search of true companionship read this book. May no woman in a failing relationship read this, either. May no man waste his time on it. No, this book didn't end up a failure. It was sentimental, but saved by its humor, and deeply moving as only a roller coaster that has been derailed can move you.
Looking back on this destabilizing half-week experience in which I could do nothing but read this book or worry about reading on, for fear I would be further traumatized, I remember now who it was whore assured me as I cried in hopelessness or went into a panic. Yes, it was my partner, a concept that O'Brien's characters cannot fathom in this chronicle. What I'm left with is a love-hate relationship. I hate this book for torturing me as it did, but I love it for invoking such strong feelings. Thank goodness there is life outside this trilogy. If this were an accurate portrayal of human relations, I think I'd kill myself.
But my fault was in over-identifying with the literate and romantic Caithleen, even as she proceeds to lose her grip on reality. Warning: these characters are extremes. I wouldn't identify too closely with any if I could avoid it. Unfortunately, I'm not very good at dividing the literary world from the literal world.
Good luck to readers and have a supportive partner or an excellent therapist should you choose to read this. I regret recommending it to my mother.
Some lines I wanted to remember, for one reason or another (no use questioning their profundity):
"He was only a shadow now, and I remembered him the way one remembers a nice dress that one has grown out of" (p. 179, not this edition)
"I used to think of my life as a failure, purposeless . . . until I got older and became aware of things. I now know that the problem of life is not solved by success but by failure: struggle and achievement and failure, on and on" (p. 220).
"He directed documentary pictures but was always buying leisure, as if in the course of leisure he must found what he had been ordained to do" (p. 391).
"'Baba, why did you do it to me?' he said. Useless to say that I hadn't thought of him when I was doing it. Useless to say that I always thought your acquaintanceship with one person had nothing to do with another" (p. 471).
"She closed her eyes on the thought that sleeping with a man was unimportant. A nothing, if nothing in the way of love preceded it. Or resulted from it" (p. 500).
April 26, 2011
I honestly don’t know what to say about this trilogy. I’m not even sure how I felt about it, really. I can’t say I loved these books, no; I didn’t love them. None of the characters were lovable, not even the main characters Baba and Caithleen. Yet I couldn’t help but care what happened to them. Even as I watched their lives spiral downwards, them make decision upon bad decision; nothing could’ve induced me to stop reading. It wasn’t like being unable to look away from a train wreck yet I suppose it kind of was. (I’m not making any sense, I know.)
The middle book, The Lonely Girl, was my favourite. The last book, Girls in their Married Bliss, was my least favourite, being the most painful to read. I can just imagine Edna O’Brien choosing that title with an ironic, bitter twist to her smile.
The Epilogue was, in my opinion, completely unnecessary and I would’ve been happier without it. Especially since, though it was only 20 pages long, it contained 10 times the amount of expletives as the other 510 pages. I wish I was kidding.
I don’t know why I was so drawn to these books! Looking back, I wonder why I didn’t hate them. As I said before, none of the characters were lovable. There was not a single good relationship in this book, not even in the strange friendship between Baba and Caithleen.
The prose didn’t strike me as being particularly exceptional. Perhaps it was, though. At least, Edna O’Brien did a lovely job conjuring up the setting. Actually, I can see several scenes in my head as if I had just finished watching a film of it.
There was something so oddly affecting about these books. Not touching, exactly. More distressing than anything. And even with the ache of these books fresh in my mind, I know I will be re-reading them someday in the future.
The middle book, The Lonely Girl, was my favourite. The last book, Girls in their Married Bliss, was my least favourite, being the most painful to read. I can just imagine Edna O’Brien choosing that title with an ironic, bitter twist to her smile.
The Epilogue was, in my opinion, completely unnecessary and I would’ve been happier without it. Especially since, though it was only 20 pages long, it contained 10 times the amount of expletives as the other 510 pages. I wish I was kidding.
I don’t know why I was so drawn to these books! Looking back, I wonder why I didn’t hate them. As I said before, none of the characters were lovable. There was not a single good relationship in this book, not even in the strange friendship between Baba and Caithleen.
The prose didn’t strike me as being particularly exceptional. Perhaps it was, though. At least, Edna O’Brien did a lovely job conjuring up the setting. Actually, I can see several scenes in my head as if I had just finished watching a film of it.
There was something so oddly affecting about these books. Not touching, exactly. More distressing than anything. And even with the ache of these books fresh in my mind, I know I will be re-reading them someday in the future.
March 17, 2021
Three books and a short epilogue telling the sorry tale of two girls growing up as friends in theocratic rural Ireland, probably in the mid-1960's. Of course, religious belief played a big role in their misfortunes, messing up their decision making skills as adults. Still, it was hard to feel sympathy for any of them. Nevertheless, a very good en engrossing read that won't be easy to forget.
March 6, 2023
The Country Girls
Childhood in the west Irish countryside, early adulthood in a boarding house in Dublin, marriage in London; the three books follow the lives of two girls Caithleen (Kate) and Bridget (Baba),who were neighbours and school friends and room mates. Though not people who had much in common, except their shared history, without that, their lives might have been much worse.
Caitheen loses her mother early on, a drowning accident and spends time at her friend Baba's house, due to the drunken binges her father goes on, his erratic behaviour causing them to lose their home.
A scholarship helps her to get an education, but Baba's idea to get them expelled, cuts short any opportunity Kate may have had to rise above the shop girl she will become.
Baba's home life had been more carefree, her father is the local vet, her mother laid back, she yearned not for much and was used to home comforts. She could be unkind and had little empathy for others, she happily insulted her friend, was shallow, less intelligent and avoided trouble unless using it for a specific outcome. She wanted to have fun, be entertained, free of consequence.
Dublin initially gives them freedom and excitement, a neon fairyland, it promises much to look forward to.
The first book is their coming-of-age, into this atmosphere of loss arrives one overly friendly neighbour Mr Gentleman, a married man who inappropriately eyes up the vulnerable young Caithleen, offering her a ride into the town, buying her lunch, indulging her with experiences that makeup for the loss and lack of love she feels, not realising she is prey, only knowing how the attention makes her feel. It is the beginning of a pattern of disappointments concerning men in her life.
The Lonely Girl
Caithleen meets Eugene,something about him (half foreign, older man) reminds her of Mr Gentleman, whom she hasn't seen for 2 years. The girls now live in Joanna and Gustav's boarding house and become a little like family in this house, sometimes confiding in Joanna, who struggles to maintain rules and boundaries with the girls.
They have one rough friend Body, who is one of the few they can rely on to escort them to dances. Neither of them are in relationships, but Caithleen yearns for the enigmatic Eugene. News of him travels to her father after he receives an anonymous letter.
He brings her home and she is forced to have an audience with the bishop - a divorced man is deemed worse than a murderer and all kinds of terrible things are said to be going to befall her in the afterlife.
Running towards Eugene brings out all her insecurities and yearnings, her lack of purpose. His age, his independence, career, worldliness, his friends - all are far from her reality. She finds some kind of comfort in his detached way of caring for her. In her immaturity, she desires to be pursued by him, as if to prove his love. It backfires, she will again feel the wound of abandonment, having acted out its consequence, the clingy holding on, the fear of disconnection and imagining potential threats to their relationship and the leaving while wishing to be pursued, only to re-experience the rejection inherent in that abandonment.
Baba tells Caithleen she is leaving for London, Baba has always been loved, but she does not use this strength to foster good in her relationships. She exhibits an emotional superiority that has inflated her self-esteem, despite her lower intelligence. Easily bored she entertains herself through extrovert behaviour and belittling others, she is decisive because she rarely compromises.
Girls in Their Married Bliss
Again time passes, so that when we encounter the girls, they are on the cusp of marriage, Kate will marry the one who abandoned her and Baba, a man who can provide for her in the manner she has desires. One desires love, the other security. Sadly, there's not much in the way of bliss.
The third book has a different feel as it is the only one narrated by Baba, so there is more of distance from Kate, who we view in the third person.
The girls drift away from each other and then come back as their lives hit various ups and downs. To some extent Kate is fulfilled by her son, but the disintegration of the relationship with her husband sets up more loss and abandonment in her life.
These are novels written in 1960's that hold nothing back, they explore the psychological depths of these two young women who grew up in a conservative Ireland, with its social problems and moral expectations, which little equipped young women pushed from the nest into the world of destructive vice and little virtue.
Childhood in the west Irish countryside, early adulthood in a boarding house in Dublin, marriage in London; the three books follow the lives of two girls Caithleen (Kate) and Bridget (Baba),who were neighbours and school friends and room mates. Though not people who had much in common, except their shared history, without that, their lives might have been much worse.
She had been nice to me for several weeks since Mama died, but when there were other girls around she always made little of me.
Caitheen loses her mother early on, a drowning accident and spends time at her friend Baba's house, due to the drunken binges her father goes on, his erratic behaviour causing them to lose their home.
I was never safe in my thoughts,because when I thought of things I was afraid.So I visited people every day, and not once did I go over the road to look at our own house.
A scholarship helps her to get an education, but Baba's idea to get them expelled, cuts short any opportunity Kate may have had to rise above the shop girl she will become.
Baba's home life had been more carefree, her father is the local vet, her mother laid back, she yearned not for much and was used to home comforts. She could be unkind and had little empathy for others, she happily insulted her friend, was shallow, less intelligent and avoided trouble unless using it for a specific outcome. She wanted to have fun, be entertained, free of consequence.
Dublin initially gives them freedom and excitement, a neon fairyland, it promises much to look forward to.
Forever more I would be restless for crowds and lights and noise. I had gone from sad noises, the lonely rain pelting on the galvanized roof of the chicken house; the moans of a cow in the night, when her calf was being born under a tree.
The first book is their coming-of-age, into this atmosphere of loss arrives one overly friendly neighbour Mr Gentleman, a married man who inappropriately eyes up the vulnerable young Caithleen, offering her a ride into the town, buying her lunch, indulging her with experiences that makeup for the loss and lack of love she feels, not realising she is prey, only knowing how the attention makes her feel. It is the beginning of a pattern of disappointments concerning men in her life.
The Lonely Girl
Caithleen meets Eugene,something about him (half foreign, older man) reminds her of Mr Gentleman, whom she hasn't seen for 2 years. The girls now live in Joanna and Gustav's boarding house and become a little like family in this house, sometimes confiding in Joanna, who struggles to maintain rules and boundaries with the girls.
For once I was not lonely, because I was with someone I wanted to be with.
They have one rough friend Body, who is one of the few they can rely on to escort them to dances. Neither of them are in relationships, but Caithleen yearns for the enigmatic Eugene. News of him travels to her father after he receives an anonymous letter.
One sadness recalls another: I stood there beside the new, crumpled coat and remembered the night my mother was drowned and how I clung to the foolish hope that it was all a mistake and that she would walk into the room, asking people why they mourned her. I prayed that he would not be married.
He brings her home and she is forced to have an audience with the bishop - a divorced man is deemed worse than a murderer and all kinds of terrible things are said to be going to befall her in the afterlife.
"Divorce is worse than murder," my aunt had always said- I would never forget it; that and their staring disapproval.
Running towards Eugene brings out all her insecurities and yearnings, her lack of purpose. His age, his independence, career, worldliness, his friends - all are far from her reality. She finds some kind of comfort in his detached way of caring for her. In her immaturity, she desires to be pursued by him, as if to prove his love. It backfires, she will again feel the wound of abandonment, having acted out its consequence, the clingy holding on, the fear of disconnection and imagining potential threats to their relationship and the leaving while wishing to be pursued, only to re-experience the rejection inherent in that abandonment.
Baba tells Caithleen she is leaving for London, Baba has always been loved, but she does not use this strength to foster good in her relationships. She exhibits an emotional superiority that has inflated her self-esteem, despite her lower intelligence. Easily bored she entertains herself through extrovert behaviour and belittling others, she is decisive because she rarely compromises.
Girls in Their Married Bliss
Again time passes, so that when we encounter the girls, they are on the cusp of marriage, Kate will marry the one who abandoned her and Baba, a man who can provide for her in the manner she has desires. One desires love, the other security. Sadly, there's not much in the way of bliss.
The third book has a different feel as it is the only one narrated by Baba, so there is more of distance from Kate, who we view in the third person.
She had plans for them both to leave their husbands one day when they'd accumulated furs and diamonds, just as once she had planned that they would meet and marry rich men and livein houses with bottle of grog opened, and unopened, on silver trays.
The girls drift away from each other and then come back as their lives hit various ups and downs. To some extent Kate is fulfilled by her son, but the disintegration of the relationship with her husband sets up more loss and abandonment in her life.
These are novels written in 1960's that hold nothing back, they explore the psychological depths of these two young women who grew up in a conservative Ireland, with its social problems and moral expectations, which little equipped young women pushed from the nest into the world of destructive vice and little virtue.
She said it was the emptiness that was the worst, the void.
August 3, 2024
Romancierii care-și isprăvesc cartea în plină vervă sunt mereu dintre cei mari.
Am văzut cărți ratate la final — sau prelungite până la zeamă chioară sau scriitori părând c-au fost constrânși să scrie la normă — de o seamă de “grei” ca: Franzen, Tartt, chiar și Auster. Paranteză: mie Franzen mi se pare supraevaluat.
O’Brien preschimbă o poveste, ce începe și continuă până în inima trilogiei într-un stil austenian, într-un roman ultramodern, un orgasm al mărturiei - în jumătatea a doua.
Dacă vocea (exasperantă) care domină primele părți este cea a lui Kate, în ultima parte, autoarea hotărăște să-și insinueze și ea vocea, schimbare radicală de ton, la urmă, dându-i cuvântul și prietenei lui Kate - iar romanul, grație acestei polifonii pe care eu am primit-o cu urale mute, devine unul epocal!
Cinismul inteligent și șarjat vulgar al lui Baba consfințește, retrospectiv, cartea.
Am văzut cărți ratate la final — sau prelungite până la zeamă chioară sau scriitori părând c-au fost constrânși să scrie la normă — de o seamă de “grei” ca: Franzen, Tartt, chiar și Auster. Paranteză: mie Franzen mi se pare supraevaluat.
O’Brien preschimbă o poveste, ce începe și continuă până în inima trilogiei într-un stil austenian, într-un roman ultramodern, un orgasm al mărturiei - în jumătatea a doua.
Dacă vocea (exasperantă) care domină primele părți este cea a lui Kate, în ultima parte, autoarea hotărăște să-și insinueze și ea vocea, schimbare radicală de ton, la urmă, dându-i cuvântul și prietenei lui Kate - iar romanul, grație acestei polifonii pe care eu am primit-o cu urale mute, devine unul epocal!
Cinismul inteligent și șarjat vulgar al lui Baba consfințește, retrospectiv, cartea.
November 14, 2014
Edna O'Brien catches the details of a culture and a period of time that seems to have occurred one hundred years ago rather than in the early 1960's. She writes with an honesty and lack of sentimentality that drew me into the story and the characters. My criticisms are all minor compared to those qualities.
June 4, 2025
Sunt total de acord cu afirmația de pe coperta 4 care spun cam asa:
„Niciun scriitor de limbă engleză nu se pricepe la fel de bine la a-l face pe cititor să se pună în pielea unei femei.“ Cel puțin din câți am citit eu până acum.
„Niciun scriitor de limbă engleză nu se pricepe la fel de bine la a-l face pe cititor să se pună în pielea unei femei.“ Cel puțin din câți am citit eu până acum.
October 6, 2018
Loved it. The trilogy consists of 3 novels - The Country Girls, The Lonely Girl, and Girls in their Married Bliss - and an epilogue, focusing on a pair of friends whom we first encounter as 14 year olds in a rural Irish village. I wondered if Elena Ferrante read these before writing the Neapolitan novels, because there were certainly similarities in the relationship between the two girls and in the acute social and gender commentary (but with more of a focus on the church as well in O’Brien). But as the trilogy continues, it takes off in a bleak and bold direction in which . I read it compulsively, powerful stuff.
September 25, 2015
I tried to make it through this, I really did. I even made it to the third book. I got a little excited when I thought Baba was going to narrate, but when it went back to Kathleen, I was just DONE. Don't get me wrong, Baba is just as despicable as Kathleen, but for different reasons. I might have finished then. But no. We go back to Kathleen's drivel. She is a spineless, whiny, reprehensible person, her family is awful, her boyfriends are awful; ugh, I just could take no more. I gave it two stars because the story did hold my attention through two books.
May 24, 2022
I have been aware of Edna O’Brien’s early work, and Country Girls in particular, for some time.
Does this book live up to my heightened expectations? One hundred pages in I was underwhelmed.
This, after all, is the book banned by Ireland's censorship board on June 21, 1960 for its explicit sexual content and described as “filth”.
Would this have happened if the DH Lawrence Lady Chatterley’s Lover court case in London in August 1960 had happened nine months before?
Lolita was published in 1955.
This is the Ireland of James Joyce.
This is a character driven book, and some characters leaped off the page.
The Brennan women, particularly, are intriguing. Mother, Martha, is described as wanting two things: “drink and admiration“ , and yet the reader is itching for her to show up her local village for the parochial killjoys that they are. Martha’s daughter Baba (Bridget) is flighty, selfish, untrustworthy, and compelling.
Caithleen Brady is just fourteen at the start of the book. She is prim, repressed, naïve, and generally fearful of her elders (& betters!). When she and Baba leave home in rural Ireland; convent educated, they “began a phase of life as the giddy country girls” on the train to Dublin”
The gist of the story is that young women need to beware of predatory men, and to wise up quickly (and have good, reliable girlfriends). Its not necessarily young boys/men who need to be watched carefully, but older men (“old” meaning aged forty or above) who have the trappings of wealth and status (a car, money to afford fancy restaurants). Men who should know better.
Jack Holland, Mr. du Maurier (Mr Gentleman), and Reginald and Harry represent different degrees of danger, and it’s a necessary learning curve (and luck) for young women to negotiate.
The lack of sex education (from family or school) is shocking by today’s standards. Cait is not worried about the risks of pregnancy – she knows you have to have been married a while for this to happen..
As I reflected on the book a week later, I realised that I needed to have tried better to transport myself back to a different (post war) world. The absence of graphic, realised tragedy does not disguise the shocking risks to women in Ireland in 1960. I’m glad to have read this book and recognise its place in helping to effect changes in society ahead of the ‘swinging sixties’.
Does this book live up to my heightened expectations? One hundred pages in I was underwhelmed.
This, after all, is the book banned by Ireland's censorship board on June 21, 1960 for its explicit sexual content and described as “filth”.
Would this have happened if the DH Lawrence Lady Chatterley’s Lover court case in London in August 1960 had happened nine months before?
Lolita was published in 1955.
This is the Ireland of James Joyce.
This is a character driven book, and some characters leaped off the page.
The Brennan women, particularly, are intriguing. Mother, Martha, is described as wanting two things: “drink and admiration“ , and yet the reader is itching for her to show up her local village for the parochial killjoys that they are. Martha’s daughter Baba (Bridget) is flighty, selfish, untrustworthy, and compelling.
Caithleen Brady is just fourteen at the start of the book. She is prim, repressed, naïve, and generally fearful of her elders (& betters!). When she and Baba leave home in rural Ireland; convent educated, they “began a phase of life as the giddy country girls” on the train to Dublin”
The gist of the story is that young women need to beware of predatory men, and to wise up quickly (and have good, reliable girlfriends). Its not necessarily young boys/men who need to be watched carefully, but older men (“old” meaning aged forty or above) who have the trappings of wealth and status (a car, money to afford fancy restaurants). Men who should know better.
Jack Holland, Mr. du Maurier (Mr Gentleman), and Reginald and Harry represent different degrees of danger, and it’s a necessary learning curve (and luck) for young women to negotiate.
The lack of sex education (from family or school) is shocking by today’s standards. Cait is not worried about the risks of pregnancy – she knows you have to have been married a while for this to happen..
As I reflected on the book a week later, I realised that I needed to have tried better to transport myself back to a different (post war) world. The absence of graphic, realised tragedy does not disguise the shocking risks to women in Ireland in 1960. I’m glad to have read this book and recognise its place in helping to effect changes in society ahead of the ‘swinging sixties’.
January 21, 2016
The Country Girls Trilogy and Epilogue is a compilation of three novels that span the lives of two girls, from childhood through middle age, who were both rivals and friends in rural Ireland. The first of the three novels, The Country Girls introduces us to Caithleen and Baba. Caithleen is practically raised by a single mother, her father often drunk and absent, leaving them with little or no money most days, while Baba's father is good provider who comes home every night, even if the family isn't exactly a happy one. Together they go off to a convent school, Caithleen on scholarship, Baba out of jealousy. The second book in the set, Lonely Girls (more commonly known by the name Girl With Green Eyes), picks up where the first leaves off, in Dublin, where the girls are set to start their lives. They live together as boarders, Baba to attend school, and Caithleen working in a grocery. What they are really looking for though is freedom and men, rich if Baba has anything to say about it. The final book of the series, Girls In Their Married Bliss opens with both of the girls marriages, both of them seemingly getting exactly what they wanted. Yet nothing is ever as it seems, and life still has many surprises in store for both of them.
Both the first and second book were told by Caithleen, later known as Kate, while the last of the trilogy and the epilogue are narrated by Baba. Kate was often ruled by her emotions, and though intelligent, she let her feelings blind her to common sense and reality. Baba is far more pragmatic; she is also brazen and bold, and in my opinion makes a far more interesting character, though Kate's story is richer. In the end, I quite enjoyed all of the books and I'm glad I read them together in one book, because I'm not sure that I would have made a point to continue soon after the first.
Both The Country Girls and Girl With Green Eyes can be found on the list of the 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die, though I actually enjoyed the last book far more. The story told in Married Bliss, while much darker, was more interesting and far richer. Yet, without the first two preceding it, it couldn't have been told. These are quintessential coming-of-age stories, both realistic and tragic, telling a story that unfolds every day, in every town and city.
Both the first and second book were told by Caithleen, later known as Kate, while the last of the trilogy and the epilogue are narrated by Baba. Kate was often ruled by her emotions, and though intelligent, she let her feelings blind her to common sense and reality. Baba is far more pragmatic; she is also brazen and bold, and in my opinion makes a far more interesting character, though Kate's story is richer. In the end, I quite enjoyed all of the books and I'm glad I read them together in one book, because I'm not sure that I would have made a point to continue soon after the first.
Both The Country Girls and Girl With Green Eyes can be found on the list of the 1001 Books You Must Read Before You Die, though I actually enjoyed the last book far more. The story told in Married Bliss, while much darker, was more interesting and far richer. Yet, without the first two preceding it, it couldn't have been told. These are quintessential coming-of-age stories, both realistic and tragic, telling a story that unfolds every day, in every town and city.
September 7, 2020
As a trilogy, this was like going out for a big meal. The starter’s amazing, the main course is ho-hum, and you wish you hadn’t ordered dessert as well. ‘The country girls’ is a joy: sharp, witty, moving, and the characters are beautifully done, especially the ‘best friend’ Baba who is a controlling little bitch but gets some great lines. You can smell the fields and the tobacco-laden interiors and the endless whisky breath, and the teenage ennui and conflicting feelings, wanting excitement and rebellion and safety and comfort at the same time are done perfectly. ‘The lonely girl’ involves a lot of weeping and I got a bit bored, while ‘Girls in their married bliss’ was too bitter and cynical even for me. Couldn’t fault the writing, but the central character throwing herself at one dubious married man after another wore rather thin.
Also, the great shock value these books had at the time of publication was centred on the scandalous idea of young women being interested in the pleasures of the flesh and not going to church. To my mind, the utter normality of endless predatory older men sniffing around two young teenage girls was far more shocking.
Also, the great shock value these books had at the time of publication was centred on the scandalous idea of young women being interested in the pleasures of the flesh and not going to church. To my mind, the utter normality of endless predatory older men sniffing around two young teenage girls was far more shocking.
March 25, 2022
Hay personas que se pasan la vida buscando, y anhelando, un estado idealizado de amor que suponga el "fueron felices para siempre. Fin". Personas que se creen el cuento del príncipe azul que llegará para salvarlas, y se quedan esperando su llegada. Y mientras tanto, su vida transcurre entre expectativas y decepciones.
Así es la vida de nuestras chicas de campo, Kate y Baba. La historia de dos niñas que se convierten en mujeres que deben enfrentar por sí mismas a los monstruos del patriarcado, el machismo, la soledad, la tristeza, la pérdida, la religión..., pero sobre todo enfrentar una realidad muy distinta de la ilusión.
Kate es una joven soñadora, que enfrenta una situación familiar difícil, que la impulsa a la búsqueda de afecto, y de la relación perfecta. Baba es una chica cínica, que sabe muy bien lo que necesita: llamar la atención, y conseguir dinero.
Con una narración muy fluida, Edna O'Brien nos guía a través de una historia llena de personajes imperfectos enfrentando la vida como pueden. Una lectura que no te deja indiferente, porque mientras la lees te enfadas con las chicas, te indignas, sufres, ríes y lloras.
Así es la vida de nuestras chicas de campo, Kate y Baba. La historia de dos niñas que se convierten en mujeres que deben enfrentar por sí mismas a los monstruos del patriarcado, el machismo, la soledad, la tristeza, la pérdida, la religión..., pero sobre todo enfrentar una realidad muy distinta de la ilusión.
Kate es una joven soñadora, que enfrenta una situación familiar difícil, que la impulsa a la búsqueda de afecto, y de la relación perfecta. Baba es una chica cínica, que sabe muy bien lo que necesita: llamar la atención, y conseguir dinero.
Con una narración muy fluida, Edna O'Brien nos guía a través de una historia llena de personajes imperfectos enfrentando la vida como pueden. Una lectura que no te deja indiferente, porque mientras la lees te enfadas con las chicas, te indignas, sufres, ríes y lloras.
January 15, 2025
This was a bookclub read, I liked the book however found it a bit far fetched. This book was banned in Ireland and therefore always had a bit of a mysterious edge to it, its an interesting story and a very good discussion book as it throws up lots topics that get people talking. Glad I read it.
July 15, 2018
Está bien, más o menos lo que esperaba, algo mucho más trágico de lo que se pinta y una invitación a reflexionar a ratos sobre nacer mujer
January 2, 2026
It’s been simmering for a while but my female rage is at an all-time high right now, and to come upon Edna O’Brien at such a time is only adding fuel to the fire. Chronicling the girlhood and womanhood experiences of two not-so-friendly friends, Cait and Baba, this trilogy of books captures the claustrophobic existence of women in a religion-infested, male-repressed Ireland.
A story of beleaguered women, surrounded on all sides by the threat of drunk, abusive fathers, pedophilic men, egoistic, emotionally-manipulative husbands, oppressive norms and conventions of the time—it’s a race of which one will get them first with some are out to kill them, others that just won't let them live, not with complete autonomy anyway.
And all this in the name of morals and values, but the ones who claim to have them are the most bereft of them. In the foreword, McBride writes, ‘’O’Brien incisively slices into the double bind of men’s attitudes towards women’s sexuality: the proprietorial notion that both male honour and male satisfaction lie in direct opposition to each other between the legs of the same women, simultaneously.’’ I couldn’t have said it better!
Cait could be a lovesick lunatic at times, intelligent but meek-minded, and Baba is more a spirited pragmatist, brazen and blasphemous. Neither of the women made the best choices, they weren’t equipped to, set up to fail in a society where neither culture nor justice is on their side. It would seem like one’s fate turned out more tragic than the other’s, but life came for them both, when all they wanted from it was to live in careless deliciousness and laugh a little.
The Country Girls Trilogy stars bleak, ends bleaker; it’s more a series of tragedies than an epic tragedy. I read it with an aching heart and a rising rage, and I am left with a terrible heaviness from it, with maybe the only solace being that Edna O’Brien’s legacy continues to live large while her persecutors lie dead in the ditch of obscurity. 5 stars!
A story of beleaguered women, surrounded on all sides by the threat of drunk, abusive fathers, pedophilic men, egoistic, emotionally-manipulative husbands, oppressive norms and conventions of the time—it’s a race of which one will get them first with some are out to kill them, others that just won't let them live, not with complete autonomy anyway.
And all this in the name of morals and values, but the ones who claim to have them are the most bereft of them. In the foreword, McBride writes, ‘’O’Brien incisively slices into the double bind of men’s attitudes towards women’s sexuality: the proprietorial notion that both male honour and male satisfaction lie in direct opposition to each other between the legs of the same women, simultaneously.’’ I couldn’t have said it better!
Cait could be a lovesick lunatic at times, intelligent but meek-minded, and Baba is more a spirited pragmatist, brazen and blasphemous. Neither of the women made the best choices, they weren’t equipped to, set up to fail in a society where neither culture nor justice is on their side. It would seem like one’s fate turned out more tragic than the other’s, but life came for them both, when all they wanted from it was to live in careless deliciousness and laugh a little.
The Country Girls Trilogy stars bleak, ends bleaker; it’s more a series of tragedies than an epic tragedy. I read it with an aching heart and a rising rage, and I am left with a terrible heaviness from it, with maybe the only solace being that Edna O’Brien’s legacy continues to live large while her persecutors lie dead in the ditch of obscurity. 5 stars!
March 17, 2025
IK HAAT DIKKE BOEKEN!!!!
maar oh my god wat was dit boek precies waar ik zin in had! 2 vriendinnen, in ierland, volgen vanaf dat ze klein zijn tot dat ze oud zijn. Zo’n iconic verhaal! maar ja dus onwijs trots op deze (bijna) 700 pagina’s die ik heb gelezen want ik wist niet dat ik het in me zou hebben! ik zou opzich, als ik niet de druk van de maatschappij zou voelen om meerdere boeken in mijn leven te lezen, dit boek wel 100 keer achter elkaar door lezen denk ik. zo’n boeiend verhaal en ik denk dat je er elke keer weer iets nieuws uit op pikt. ook geweldig geschreven met veel humor en mooie zinnen. ik wil meer boeken van haar lezen maar nu eerst ff weer verder met mijn themamaanx: ierland. break down = next!!! (thema maand stopt vrijdag als ik in dublin ben).
mochten mensen nog ierland boekentips hebben, throw them at me!
maar oh my god wat was dit boek precies waar ik zin in had! 2 vriendinnen, in ierland, volgen vanaf dat ze klein zijn tot dat ze oud zijn. Zo’n iconic verhaal! maar ja dus onwijs trots op deze (bijna) 700 pagina’s die ik heb gelezen want ik wist niet dat ik het in me zou hebben! ik zou opzich, als ik niet de druk van de maatschappij zou voelen om meerdere boeken in mijn leven te lezen, dit boek wel 100 keer achter elkaar door lezen denk ik. zo’n boeiend verhaal en ik denk dat je er elke keer weer iets nieuws uit op pikt. ook geweldig geschreven met veel humor en mooie zinnen. ik wil meer boeken van haar lezen maar nu eerst ff weer verder met mijn themamaanx: ierland. break down = next!!! (thema maand stopt vrijdag als ik in dublin ben).
mochten mensen nog ierland boekentips hebben, throw them at me!
November 8, 2025
Im going to re-read this, prompted by its appearance in Niall Williams‘ The Time of the Child, which I’m reading now, and reviews from friends Laura and Lisa.
June 10, 2014
I was really excited about this book. There are some very dramatic review on here and I expected a story more along the lines of Half Broke Horse. This was just kind of boring and the main characters really had me not rooting for them much. I thought this was supposed to be a tale of girls bucking society/church norms by living and doing what they want, but these girls really didn't do much of anything.
Guess I wanted a tale of strong women, but got a long drawn out "diary" about silly girls that never really seemed to have grown up.
Guess I wanted a tale of strong women, but got a long drawn out "diary" about silly girls that never really seemed to have grown up.
October 26, 2020
Важна книга за 20век в Ирландия. Противоречива, едновременно интимна и обществено значима, “женска” книга. Освен социалния фон обаче, важни за мен бяха фино изградените образи - на Кейт, която няма как да харесвам (мъченицата/ жертва) и на Баба (Бриджит/ Барбра, светицата, която се превръща в светска жена). Трилогията минава през травмирано детство и abusive relationship, манипулативни отношения и почвата им върху безличието, слабостта и подчинението в прекършената рано психика. Колко по-ясен и прост е животът, когато говори Баба, колко трагично-жалка е и си остава Кейт. От двете екранизации предпочитам тази на втората част “Момичето със зелените очи”. Версията със Сам Нийл от 1983 е почти отблъскваща трактовка.
April 24, 2022
La primera parte está muy bien, la Segunda tiene sus momentos y la tercera es un completo desastre en todos los sentidos. El final de verdad que destroza a los personajes y al lector....
July 29, 2025
just astonishing! one of the best books i've ever read!
October 18, 2014
I've only read the first part so far; waiting for the complete edition from Amazon.
O'Brien captures perfectly, in my opinion, the era and place she is concerned with. Not as downtrodden as "Angela's Ashes" by any means, but certainly far, far from sweetness and light. The pervading sadness and sense of claustrophobia subsuming the girls' lives struck me as true to life. The Catholic upbringing and the narrowness of the girls' options reflect my memories of those days pretty well. (Of course, we had many more options here in the U.S.)I was suprised a bit at others becoming so impatient with Cait and Baba's behaviors. I'm looking forward to seeing how their lives "turn out".
Updated October 30, 2009: I finished the entire trilogy earlier this month; found that I had to go back and re-read the first section to refresh my memory and to get back into the "feel" of the story. Although there are many comical passages, the overwhelming sensation is one of depression and hopelessness. Even Baba, by far the more resiliant of the two girls, leads an unhappy life in an almost helpless sort of way.
Well worth reading, if only to remind us of how far women have come in the intervening thirty years.
O'Brien captures perfectly, in my opinion, the era and place she is concerned with. Not as downtrodden as "Angela's Ashes" by any means, but certainly far, far from sweetness and light. The pervading sadness and sense of claustrophobia subsuming the girls' lives struck me as true to life. The Catholic upbringing and the narrowness of the girls' options reflect my memories of those days pretty well. (Of course, we had many more options here in the U.S.)I was suprised a bit at others becoming so impatient with Cait and Baba's behaviors. I'm looking forward to seeing how their lives "turn out".
Updated October 30, 2009: I finished the entire trilogy earlier this month; found that I had to go back and re-read the first section to refresh my memory and to get back into the "feel" of the story. Although there are many comical passages, the overwhelming sensation is one of depression and hopelessness. Even Baba, by far the more resiliant of the two girls, leads an unhappy life in an almost helpless sort of way.
Well worth reading, if only to remind us of how far women have come in the intervening thirty years.
June 30, 2008
EDNA O'BRIEN: IRELAND'S OTHER LITERARY HEAVYWEIGHT
By Jim Ruland
O’Brien’s relationship with Ireland has always been a cantankerous one. Her first novel, The Country Girls, written in 1959 during a three-week frenzy, was condemned by the minister of culture as a “smear on Irish womanhood.” The book, which deals with the sexual awakening of a young woman from a small village in west Ireland, was promptly banned. As were her next eight novels.
The problem? O’Brien writes about sex and its repercussions in a way that is graphic, frank and utterly unheard of in conservative, “priest-plagued” Ireland. Her first three novels follow the adventures of Caithleen and Baba as they flee their convent school in rural Ireland, find considerably older husbands in Dublin, and confront their failed marriages in London. Along the way, the girls conceive out of wedlock, have extramarital affairs and contract venereal disease.
Read the rest of Jim Ruland's article on Edna O'Brien here:
http://www.laweekly.com/art+books/boo...
By Jim Ruland
O’Brien’s relationship with Ireland has always been a cantankerous one. Her first novel, The Country Girls, written in 1959 during a three-week frenzy, was condemned by the minister of culture as a “smear on Irish womanhood.” The book, which deals with the sexual awakening of a young woman from a small village in west Ireland, was promptly banned. As were her next eight novels.
The problem? O’Brien writes about sex and its repercussions in a way that is graphic, frank and utterly unheard of in conservative, “priest-plagued” Ireland. Her first three novels follow the adventures of Caithleen and Baba as they flee their convent school in rural Ireland, find considerably older husbands in Dublin, and confront their failed marriages in London. Along the way, the girls conceive out of wedlock, have extramarital affairs and contract venereal disease.
Read the rest of Jim Ruland's article on Edna O'Brien here:
http://www.laweekly.com/art+books/boo...
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