Edna O'Brien

Might as well get it out of the way from the beginning: Charles Gordon, Lord Byron, was a bad boy. Today we would consider him a serial rapist, pedophile, bankrupt, political meddler, philanderer, adulterer, effete, alchoholic, bearer of sexually transmitted diseases, slanderer, and libeller. Back in the early 19th century he would also have been considered a criminal for committing incest and sodomy, although sodomy today doesn't have the same cache it once did, except maybe in Saudi Arabia and Russia.

This is the poster boy for the Romantic Movement and possibly the first celebrity in the modern sense. This is the man your kids are studying in those demure liberal arts colleges in New England. And like modern celebrities, he got away with it all.

In "Byron in Love," Edna O'Brien captures much of the hero worship that accompanied him from his early 20's right up until his death after catching a cold at 37.

Although he was born into wealth, a libertine father drove his family into poverty. Then, with the death of an heirless uncle, he inherited the title and accompanying wealth. At the age of 10! Sort of like winning the lottery. In a big way.

Already in his teens he fathered a bastard, compensated for a birth deformity by learning how to fight with his fists at boarding school, and keep within close reach a boxing coach. Bully? You might say that.

He took his seat in the House of Lords and made a few speeches championing liberal causes. And he was always one step ahead of his creditors. Of which there were many.

And he wrote. For the day, he wrote shocking and shockingly beautiful poetry. And this drove the girls (and the boys) crazy. So crazy in fact, the Pope sent spies to trail him during his years in Italy seducing maidens and matrons alike.… (more)

I could have categorized The Country Girls under "A Trilogy," and perhaps reading all three novels would have helped me appreciate this one more. Not being Irish, Catholic or a child of the '50s (much less female) prevented me from comprehending the groundbreaking nature of Edna O'Brien's story without the insights provided in the introduction (which I read after the novel and should be taken with a grain of feminist salt).

The Country Girls is the story of two young Irish girls, Caithleen and Bridget, who maintain a tenuous friendship through the death of Cait's mother and their "incarceration" in the convent they were sent to, ostensibly to be educated. During this time, fourteen-year-old Cait begins a highly romanticized affair with a much older married man referred to as Mr. Gentleman due to her difficulty pronouncing his surname. She is ultimately expelled from the school her family cannot afford without the scholarship she earns after succumbing to the malignant influence of her purported friend. Whereupon the girls take up joint residency of a room in a lower-class boardinghouse in Dublin and their "education" continues.

Another book on all versions of the 1,001 Books You Must Read Before You Die list, The Country Girls reads like a train wreck in the making, with the premonition of catastrophe awaiting in the subsequent volumes.… (more)