An Irish Eye

by John Hawkes

Thirteen-year-old narrator Dervla O'Shannon describes growing up in a foundling home, her courtship by an old soldier and her outrageous letters about it, Corporal Stack's shocking injury, and her captivity (with the elderly Stack) at a ruined Anglo-Irish estate

Genres: Fiction, Novels

287 pages, Hardcover

First published September 1, 1997

About the author

John Hawkes, born John Clendennin Talbot Burne Hawkes, Jr., was a postmodern American novelist, known for the intensity of his work, which suspended the traditional constraints of the narrative.

Born in Stamford, Connecticut, and educated at Harvard University, Hawkes taught at Brown University for thirty years. Although he published his first novel, The Cannibal, in 1949, it was The Lime Twig (1961) that first won him acclaim. Later, however, his second novel, The Beetle Leg, an intensely surrealistic western set in a Montana landscape that T. S. Eliot might have conjured, came to be viewed by many critics as one of the landmark novels of 20th Century American literature.

Hawkes died in Providence, Rhode Island.

Reviews

[Маx Nestelieiev · Rating 3 out of 5]

останній, чи то 16-й, чи то 17-й, роман майстра. оповідач він цікавий (тут від імені 13-річної Дервли), але сюжетність ніколи не любив, через це, текст схожий на все і водночас закінчується нічим. як і попередній роман - дія закільцьована, але це точно не "Джойс, що вдає братів Грімм", скоріше старенький письменник уявляє про те, як думає дівчина-підліток.

[Pragya · Rating 3 out of 5]

An Irish Eye was like a Ghbili movie in the sense that if anyone asked me what this book was about I would not know what to say. All I can say for certain is that the prose was very descriptive and artful, and I felt like I was dreaming while reading it. There was definitely some sort of magic/ enchantment in this book that put me to sleep every 10 pages read, which made it very difficult to follow the plot (what plot?) and confusing.

[Casey · Rating 2 out of 5]

There was nothing that I found overtly offensive about this book (not even the relationship between thirteen-year-old Dervla and semi-ancient Corporal Stack), but I just didn't love it. Or even really like it.

[Lea Ann · Rating 2 out of 5]

Odd story. A couple of bright spots in the book, but most of the time reading it I was just confused. First half of the book is more interesting than the last - had to push my way through, although the final passage is fairly satisfying.

[Patrick Schmelz · Rating 3 out of 5]

I imagine several folks will not like this book because they will find it hard to relate to or just will find the storyline too unbelievable, but I enjoyed it. It is a period piece from a time when social norms were quite different and I found it interesting to have a book from the perspective of a 13-year old "foundling." Although it wasn't brilliant all the way through, there were parts of it that were very, very good and a pleasure to read and Dervla O'Shannon herself and the way she sees the world is good fun.

[Karen · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's a quick read, so there's that. It's written from the perspective of a 13 year old foundling and basically includes every thought, real, imagined or otherwise that pops into her head. It ends abruptly and your not sure if she dreamt the whole thing or what parts of it might have been her reality. Can't believe I finished it.

[Ashley Halada · Rating 3 out of 5]

I liked it but dont know what I liked about it!..it flowed nicely. I liked how it was written. Easy read but it was hard to relate to a 13 year old.

[Graeme Waymark · Rating 4 out of 5]

My first by this wonderful contemporary author. I will write more, suffice to say, it is quite the contrast to reading “The HandMaid’s Tale” by Atwood!

[P. · Rating 2 out of 5]

A friend recommended this to me, and lo, it was on the shelf at my library. I read it on a sunny Sunday morning, as it is a a small format book and only 160 pages (probably half that in regular size).

Hawkes has created a compelling exercise in first person stream of consciousness. Our Dervla narrates her life and we follow along, and are not really sure what is real and what is not - especially once the book reaches its halfway point it gets a slightly hallucinatory feel. Dervla is partially kidnapped and definitely indentured, along with her true love, the elderly Corporal Stack (nothing consummated, don't worry). The tone is somewhere between Jude the Obscure and Jane Eyre, and I found myself thinking back to it after I read it, wondering what else happened and feeling like the book itself had told me without actually having it written on the pages. Here's a sample:

"The laundry room, now, was nearly as wondrous a place as the kitchen, and as dangerous. The heaps of little garments with their various stains were in themselves startling to the mind, bereft as they were of the bodies they had so recently covered, all these bits of clothing collapsed and deflated and haphazard in piles that made me think of dead children or small girls missing in some sort of mysterious naked flight over the forbidden country round. And oh the vats and tubs into which we flung these remnants as of some terrible slaughter that had never occurred but made us shiver all the same, and the wooden paddles with which we pushed and beat our sisters' clothes in water smelling of some dread chemical and burning our nostrils. While outside, beyond the grated windows above our heads, for the laundry was in the basement of the Foundling Home, crows sang as best they could and washed themselves in the rain." (6)

[Gloria · Rating 1 out of 5]

Every now and then I read a book that makes me want to give up reading all together. After such a book months go by before I remember how much I like reading fiction. An Irish Eye is one of those books. Perhaps why it went out of print nearly as soon as it was printed. I had never heard of the book and read it for my book club.

At best tedious but mostly disturbing, the description describes the protagonist's courtship with a an older man as "improbable and uproarious." It is hard to find anything uproarious about a 13 year old "foundling" courting a 60+ year old man. Do not go out of your way to find this book. The only thing good about it is that it is short--about 160 pages. I couldn't get through it quick enough.

[Jen · Rating 2 out of 5]

Told in the first person from the point of view of a preteen Irish foundling, I had the feeling throughout this novel that the speaker was actually an old, male English professor (which, of course, it was). This wasn't bad, exactly, and I did manage to finish it. I did enjoy the parts of the book set in the old soldiers' home...Dervla's first encounter with her true love (an elderly soldier, then wearing full military uniform complete with gas mask) was touching and funny.

[Lillian · Rating 1 out of 5]

would give this zero stars if I could. Unintelligible.

[April · Rating 3 out of 5]

Interesting and odd. A puzzle of a book. GOOD.