A PAGAN PLACE

by Edna O'Brien ‧ RELEASE DATE: April 14, 1970

You grew up there. . . in one of those Irish Country Girl villages with thirty pubs and a pagan place, a ""fort of dark trees"" with darker phantoms. . . . You had a father who kept the peace when he wasn't drunk. . . and an Aunt Bride whose husband was shot in broad daylight by the Tans. . . and a sister Emma, wayward and supercilious after going off to the city. . . and a teacher Miss Davitt who went mad and drowned herself. . . and a fear of those ""vast dimensionless places"" where someone ""might nail you down and do pooly in you"" only it was not the devil, or your cousin, but the priest and the ""occasion of sin"" which drove you away forever--to a convent. . . If this new book is a tour de force, it is also a triumph--a ""mixum-gatherum"" of memories sparked by the artifacts of a time and a locale (tea roses and blackberry wine, novenas and hens' droppings) all rendered with a surface luminosity which distinguishes Miss O'Brien's novels and makes them connect in a sweet, sad fashion. You, another you, are right there.

Pub Date: April 14, 1970

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Knopf

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: April 1, 1970

Categories: FICTION