Sally Rooney's Normal People

A classic novel turned upside-down and inside-out:

Normal People is just another cliché of classic romantic novels, of which Pride and Prejudice is probably the most obvious; a genre which has been repeated and imitated to death, and NP is another installment - well, readers of certain synopses might mistakenly think so.

The first page produces an immediate sense that "this is different"; the tension in a situation we have just entered (but that is familiar to us all), the eroticism, the anxiety (paradoxically, after they have received such good exam results - but the dreaded Leaving Cert is coming up), Connell's awkwardness; in short, it feels real. If one was to compare it to P&P for its similar plot - and various sources have ^{(8, 18)} - one could also compare the realism of the characters of both novels; the accuracy and simplicity of the description and dialogue.

NP, like other great works of art, is a consciously political piece. Of course, P&P was political too. Rooney has admitted the influence Victorian novels have had on her writing ⁽³⁾. She has brought contemporary social inequalities and mores into the picture - something Austen did too in P&P. There is a social pressure exerted between NP's Marianne and Connell that divides them despite their wishes. Connell feels pressured into rejecting Marianne and repressing his own feelings for her, just as social customs divided Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy. Recall that famous showdown between Lady Catherine de Bourgh and Elizabeth Bennet:

My duaghter and my nephew are formed for each other. They are descended, on the maternal side, from the same noble line; and, on the father's, from respectable, honorable, and ancient - though untitled - families. Their fortune on both sides is splendid. They are destined for each other by the voice of every member of their respective houses; and what is to divide them? The upstart pretensions of a young woman without family, connections or fortune. Is this to be endured! But it must not, shall not be. If you were sensible of your own good, you would not wish to quit the sphere in which you have been brought up".

"In marrying your nephew, I should not consider myself as quitting that sphere. He is a gentleman; I am a gentleman's daughter; so far we are equal.

But it's no simple formulaic re-writing of P&P - very far from it. As with anything revolutionary, Rooney has turned a traditional idea upside-down and inside-out. In NP, Rooney has inverted the concept of P&P. Whereas Austen - in the passage above - emphsised the fundamental equality between Mr. Darcy and Ms. Bennet (something revolutionary for its time), Rooney emphasises the inequality between Connell and Marianne. Whereas Jane Austen experienced a time when class distinction was promoted (the gentility and commoners), Sally Rooney portrays an epoch where class difference is concealed (capitalist and worker).

Connell is like Darcy in that he is a "strong and silent" character. He needs Marianne as Darcy needed Elizabeth "in spite of all his endeavours". Connell, like Darcy, harbours secret feelings created and aggravated by the society in which he lives. But Connell's character is an inverted Darcy. Whereas Darcy was a wealthy aristocrat, Connell is working-class. It is Connell who is dependent on Marianne for money, his mother is paid by Marianne's mother, he needs money for taxis from her, and he needs a place to stay etc. Connell and Marianne have sex before they reveal their feelings for each other - an impossible concept for Austen's time. Darcy is the quintessential patriarch; inheritor of a prestigous lineage, to whom people are obliged; Marianne has ultimate power over Connell; she has the overarching advantages of class privilege - but her power is not complete. Connell holds power over Marianne; physical power, emotional power, the power that comes with popularity, the power that he inherits from in a patriarchal society - even if he is not keen on exploiting it. This is the intricate power-dynamic of the novel, and a microcosm of the complex power-dynamics within contemporary European capitalist society.

P&P is, among other things, a brilliant parody of the society of its time. The reader will laugh at the silliness, hypocrisy, and the relative plight of the Bennets and other characters; Mr Bennet even acknowledges, 'for what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbours, and laugh at them in our turn'. Brilliant in so many ways, it may be one of the wittiest novels ever written. In contrast, NP is a novel of relatively little humour, and words that describe humour are used ironically. For example, in one scene, Rachel thought Pat sexually harrassing Marianne in the nightclub was 'funny', although of course for Marianne, 'He wasn't joking, he wanted to hurt her'. If there is a lightness to P&P, there's a proportionate darkness to NP.

It is not an exaggeration to say (given NP's amazing popularity) that Rooney is doing for feminist and progressive proletarian ideas of our time what Austen did for feminist and burgeoning bourgeois ideas of hers. What's more, NP is doing much for raising discussion around men's mental health issues (discussed further in the next part).

This is the first part of a planned multi-part review. I plan to publish the other sections once I have time to edit them. When all sections are published, I will compile them as one article.

Elon J Lerlow

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