holiman reviewed Normal People by Sally Rooney
Classic Rooney
4 stars
As an author, Sally Rooney (in Normal People), is very much not a typical Author. She doesn't use language to dazzle and flaunt, there are no long-winded poetic descriptions here. She uses language to explain something, arranging sentences in a series reminiscent of how a mathematical proof is constructed.
Maybe more accurate to call her an anthropologist: observing humans, their interactions. For the viewer, she is describing the motivations, the contexts, the individuals thoughts and feelings. And how what follows is nothing but the most natural course of events, given the full context.
She has an ability to and dissect, very subtle emotions and interactions.
He seemed to think Marianne had access to a range of different identities, between which she slipped effortlessly. This suprised her, because she usually felt confined inside on single personality, which was always the same regardless of what she did or said. She had tried …
As an author, Sally Rooney (in Normal People), is very much not a typical Author. She doesn't use language to dazzle and flaunt, there are no long-winded poetic descriptions here. She uses language to explain something, arranging sentences in a series reminiscent of how a mathematical proof is constructed.
Maybe more accurate to call her an anthropologist: observing humans, their interactions. For the viewer, she is describing the motivations, the contexts, the individuals thoughts and feelings. And how what follows is nothing but the most natural course of events, given the full context.
She has an ability to and dissect, very subtle emotions and interactions.
He seemed to think Marianne had access to a range of different identities, between which she slipped effortlessly. This suprised her, because she usually felt confined inside on single personality, which was always the same regardless of what she did or said. She had tried to be different in the past, as a kind of experiment, but it had never worked. If she was different with Connell, the difference was not happening inside herself, in her pesonhood, but in between them, in the dynamic.
Or how shifts in context affects feeling of self, after Connell moves from his hometown
Back home, Connel's shyness never seemed like much of an obstacle to his social life, because everyone knew who he was already, and there was never any need to introduce himself or create impressions about his personality. If anything, his personality seemed like something extenal to himself, managed by the opinions of others, rather than anything he individually did or produced. Now he has a sense of invisibility, nothingness, with no reputation to recommend him to anyone. Though his physical appearance has not changed, he feels objectively worse-looking than he used to be.
Solid Rooney