- Hardcover: 195 pages
- Publisher: Little, Brown; [1st American ed.] edition (1975)
- ISBN-10: 0316558516
- ISBN-13: 978-0316558518
- Product Dimensions: 20.6 x 14.5 x 2.5 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (2 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 1,560,093 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
The Leavetaking
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
The material for this book echoes that of The Barracks and Memoirs, and is further evidence that the author wrote from life. The leave-taking itself refers to a teacher's last day at school - he is about to be sacked. The story flashes back to his childhood - an adored mother who dies young and a brutal father - this in an oppressive Ireland have indelibly marked the growing boy and the man he becomes. Between these events, in a year's leave of absence in London, a freer and more certain person finds love and contentment. The return to Ireland is accompanied by a air of doom.
There is a gentleness, tenderness even, to many of McGahern's characters, who are overwhelmed by tragic events. Or rather the one tragic event - the loss of a loved and loving parent. The book is infused with a melancholy, futility and even fatalism, but I do not find it whinging or too oppressive.
To me the genius of McGarhen's writing is how he infuses everything with this overwhelming feeling - how it is echoed in the landscape of Ireland. Human interaction, on the other hand, seems reduced to a formal sing-song like lines in a play or opera - ignoring the heartache within.
Not as shocking as The Barracks, not as lyrical as That They May Face the Rising Sun, but still up there....
There is a gentleness, tenderness even, to many of McGahern's characters, who are overwhelmed by tragic events. Or rather the one tragic event - the loss of a loved and loving parent. The book is infused with a melancholy, futility and even fatalism, but I do not find it whinging or too oppressive.
To me the genius of McGarhen's writing is how he infuses everything with this overwhelming feeling - how it is echoed in the landscape of Ireland. Human interaction, on the other hand, seems reduced to a formal sing-song like lines in a play or opera - ignoring the heartache within.
Not as shocking as The Barracks, not as lyrical as That They May Face the Rising Sun, but still up there....
Format:Paperback
The Leavetaking is a well written novel but without the passion and lyricism I usually associate with John McGahern..it is an early novel so maybe he hadn't quite dveloped his style..however the parts set in Ireland were far better than the time in London, his description of the American wife and life in London felt hollow and unconvincing.
Most Helpful Customer Reviews on Amazon.com (beta)
Amazon.com:
1 review
In his Irish mind
23 Dec 2011
There is little question that McGahern's highly-touted writing is autobiographical. That bothers me only because he so belabors what's in his mind; it is not creative but ruminative. To me the value is that he has some special ability to ponder then express his thoughts in a particularly lucid manner, and that he chronicles Irish life of his time - not just physical and social details, but the overall emotional climate. In those regards he is a great craftsman.
In "The Leavetaking" he deals primarily with teaching in Catholic Ireland where the state is paying but allowing the clergy to make all their Rome-directed, hate-filled, hide-bound decisions that in no way follow the teachings of Christ. The other theme, of course, is the lingering, never resolved aftermath of McGahern's mother's death, woven into the mindcloth of the protagonist. The scene is set: you, the reader, are in the Ireland of the time, then in London with the leavetaker, then flowing into the rest of your life.
In "The Leavetaking" he deals primarily with teaching in Catholic Ireland where the state is paying but allowing the clergy to make all their Rome-directed, hate-filled, hide-bound decisions that in no way follow the teachings of Christ. The other theme, of course, is the lingering, never resolved aftermath of McGahern's mother's death, woven into the mindcloth of the protagonist. The scene is set: you, the reader, are in the Ireland of the time, then in London with the leavetaker, then flowing into the rest of your life.
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