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A carregar... The Valley of the Squinting Windows (1918)por Brinsley MacNamara
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Valley of the Squinting Windowsis a classic Irish novel set in central Ireland c. 1914-16. Garradrimna is a tiny village where everyone is interested in everyone else's business and wishes them to fail. Twenty years before the events of the book, Nan Byrne has a relationship with a local man, Henry Shannon, hoping to marry him for his wealth. She falls pregnant but Henry refuses to marry her. After a miscarriage, the baby is buried at the bottom of the garden. Henry marries another woman and later dies, while Nan emigrates to England and marries Ned Brennan. They later move back to Garradrimna, where the villagers rejoice in telling Ned about his wife's past.Ned is now an alcoholic, brought low by the humiliation of his wife's past promiscuity. He makes a little as a labourer, whereas Nan works every day at sewing to support their only child, John, studying in England to become a Catholic priest. However, she has become as cruel, petty and jealous as the rest of Garradrimna, and connives with the postmistress to sabotage Myles Shannon's chance at romance with an English girl, to get revenge on the Shannon family for rejecting her.John returns to Garradrimna for a holiday, where he befriends Ulick Shannon (son of Henry) and falls for Rebecca Kerr, a schoolteacher. Ulick and Rebecca have a relationship, however, and when Rebecca becomes pregnant she is disgraced and expelled from the village. Ulick abandons her and John murders him, weighing the body with lead and hiding it in the lake. Rebecca leaves for Dublin and an uncertain future. An old gossip informs Nan and John that she was there the night Nan gave birth to Henry's child - in reality, the child was born alive and was given to Henry and his wife - who they raised as their son, Ulick Shannon. Não foram encontradas descrições de bibliotecas. |
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Google Books — A carregar... GénerosSistema Decimal de Melvil (DDC)823.912Literature English & Old English literatures English fiction Modern Period 1901-1999 1901-1945Classificação da Biblioteca do Congresso dos EUA (LCC)AvaliaçãoMédia:
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It's mostly the story of Nan Brennan, born Byrne, who is quite sanctimonious but hiding the fact that she had a child out of wedlock. Marrying back into where she came from her secret is known to several of the gossips in the area and they abuse they heap on her causes her to become more bitter (and to blackmail her). Things get complicated when her son, John, who is studying to become a priest comes home from holidays. Then a new attractive woman, Rebecca Kerr is appointed as assistant teacher and Ulick Shannon, nephew to Myles Shannon and son of the man who "disgraced" Nan, comes to visit during a holiday.
For all that it was published in 1918 (and does contain references to the Great War) it's quite a topical novel and quite interesting. While some of it felt a bit "stage Irish" I could see some of the characters I knew in my youth, only exhagerated. ( )