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Thursday, May 12, 2011

Brooklyn - Plot, Cultural Context

In the Novel 'Brooklyn' by Colm Tóibín, the plot is quite straightforward, but also really interesting and gripping.


Eilís, a young girl from Wexford, leaves her home to go to Brooklyn, America, In search of work. She finds work in Bartocci's in Brooklyn. While in Brooklyn, She finds the opportunity to educate herself in night courses after work. She is staying with Ms. Kehoe, along with other girls from Ireland also in Brooklyn looking for work. While in Brooklyn, Eilís falls in love with an Italian-American, Tony. But then, tragedy strikes when Eilís gets news from home, her sister, Rose, had passed away. Just before Eilís leaves Brooklyn to go back to Ireland, Tony proposes to her. Eilís accepts. When back at home, she see's her mother and friends, and also begins to get on very well with a neighbour, Jim Farrell. She has not told her mother that she is married, but then soon, tells her. In the end, her mother tells her to go back to Brooklyn to Tony.


I learnt from this book from the cultural context that in the world in the book, 1950's, things seem much simpler, but they also seem to relate to this world now as Eilís is emigrating to find job opportunities. Many people in Ireland now face emigration in search of work as there is not much work in Ireland. The way of communication is also very simple as in the book, they write letters to each other, which in today's world, is actually quite rare as many people today communicate by phone, email or social networking. Eilís had to travel to Brooklyn by boat transfers, which indicates that planes weren't very common in the 1950's. I would like to live back in this world as life seems much simpler and easier, although facing emigration for work is a hard thing to do. They have no phones or email, which makes things seem much more simpler. I think that the 1950;s would be a good time to live in.










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