Secret Scriptures
By Sebastian Barry
Roseanne McNulty is 100 years old and has spent over half of her of life in the Roscommon Regional Mental Hospital when she begins the secret journal. But the voice recalling many years full of turmoil and sorrow does not sound mad. Her language is at once precise and lyrical, full of poetry, yet firmly grounded. Her personal tragedy is gradually depicted against the backdrop of sectarian violence and a whole country in upheaval.
Roseanne's journal is interspersed with the commonplace book of Dr. Green, manager of the mental hospital. The institution is being downsized, and he must determine who should be given the freedom to return to the community. Though well meaning he is absorbed in his own sorrow, mourning first the failure of his marriage, then the death of his wife. There are few records to help him evaluate Roseanne, and she is not particularly helpful to him.
Dr. Green's search for clues as to why Roseanne was institutionalized finds a somewhat different history than the one the revealed in her journal raising many questions for the reader. Was her father a member of the hated Irish police, or merely a grave digger? How did he die? If she was married, why did she tell Dr. Green he should address herby her maiden name? Did she kill her only child at birth? If not what happened to him? And the big one - is she mad?
The quality of Barry's language and the vividness of Roseanne's story more than compensate for the occasionally awkward device of the two journals and slightly too pat ending. The people in Roseanne's past; the stifling life of a small town contrasted to the wild openness of the sea; the eternal Irish rain all come alive on the page. Curl up with this book before a toasty fire on a wet evening and you might not be sure whether the misty rain outside your window is coming in off Puget Sound or Sligo Bay.
Leave a comment