Set in Ireland, Normal People is a relatable love story about two individuals – Marianne and Connell – who were attracted to one another in High School and continue to love each other for years to come. The book starts off as a typical high school romance, with Marianne living in a mansion with minimal adult supervision when she meets Connell, her house cleaner’s son, who is also Marianna’s classmate.
It is sweet to read about two teenagers falling in love. Connell, star student and soccer player is well-liked by everyone, keeps his relationship with Marianne concealed to meet social norms and acts like a typical idiot, but the story gets progressively interesting as these two individuals enter adulthood, and their repeated behavioral patterns reveal the depths of their characters and reasons thereof.
In the beginning, I was waiting for the two of them to finally accept their love for each other and enter the next stage of their relationship. However, I quickly realized that the book rather examines the evolution of the two main characters. It explores the shifts of social currency during different stages of their lives. For instance, in High School, Connell holds more social currency against Marianna’s coldness, but the roles reverse in University when Marianna, again, like a typical story, “turns pretty” and gains a higher social status, and Connell is left navigating the scene with the rich adjacent.
It was an absolute pleasure reading this compelling story. The language is simple and cohesive. Although I like to take my time when reading a novel, I finished this one in a heartbeat.
Abuse and classism
Devoid of graphic details, the book beautifully studies the intimacy between the two and their social differences. It pierces the heart as Marianne experiences abuse. When it starts at school, the readers may think it’s probably teenagers making poor choices, but in University, despite her newly gained pretty privilege, Marianne finds herself untapped in deeply masochistic relationships, perhaps stemming from something deep within. Isn’t that always the case? Don’t we gravitate towards familiar patterns?
Connell, who kept his relationship with Marianne a secret to maintain his social status in school, finds himself lurking in the emerging social scene, friend-zoned by his former secret lover. He refuses to be a social climber and respects the new social boundaries. They find themselves undeniably in love with each other, struggle to let go of their inhibitions, and find normalcy.
The issue of social acceptance and having social currency is highly relevant and yet less talked about. It remains a stark backdrop, and Rooney unabashedly makes clever comments about classism throughout the book, such as this one,
literature fetishized for its ability to take educated people on false emotional journeys, so that they might afterward feel superior to the uneducated people whose emotional journeys they liked to read about.
…which made me blush!
Sally Rooney: Author
Rooney was born and brought up in Dublin, Ireland. In writing this novel, she drew inspiration from her personal experiences of living there and her English studies at Trinity College, Dublin, just like the characters in her novel.
She is a self proclaimed Marxist and interestingly one can draw parallels between her and her characters who seem to have no regard for the capitalist longings.
Written in 2018, Normal people is only her second novel. It has been widely acclaimed and has won seven awards. By 2020 her book was made into a television adaptation on BBC and again went on to receive much deserved adulations from well known critics and publications.
Noteworthy quotations
There’s no such thing as bad weather, only bad clothes.
Is the world such an evil place, that love should be indistinguishable from the basest and most abusive forms of violence?
…cruelty does not only hurt the victim, but the perpetrator also, and maybe more deeply and more permanently. You learn nothing very profound about yourself simply by being bullied; but by bullying someone else you learn something you can never forget.
No one can be independent of other people completely, so why not give up the attempt, she thought, go running in the other direction, depend on people for everything, allow them to depend on you, why not.
People can really change one another.
Contemporology 