“I have to keep convincing myself”, Helen said when they got outside, “that this is really happening. You’re all so matter-of-fact about it, but the truth is that he is dying in there and I have to go and tell my mother.”
Helen’s beloved little brother is dying. This brings the family together again — grandmother Dora, mother Lily, and daughter Helen. While her brother Declan has a seemingly casual relationship with his mother and grandmother, Helen hasn’t seen both for years and didn’t even invite them to her wedding. Her mother has never seen her two grandchildren, her grandmother met Helen’s family — her husband and her two sons — only once. Safe to say this is a family reunion under the worst possible circumstances.
Here’s what the blurb tells us:
It is Ireland in the early 1990s. Three women, Dora Devereux, her daughter Lily, and her grand-daughter Helen, have arrived, after years of strife, at an uneasy peace with each other. They know that in the years ahead it will be necessary for them to keep their distance. Now, however, Declam, Helen’s adored brother, is dying and the three of them come together in the grandmother’s crumbling old house with two of Declan’s friends. All six of them, from different generations and with different beliefs, are forced to listen to each other and come to terms with each other.
Reading this, I immediately thought of something blunt like an alcoholic grandmother, a crackhead mother, and two highly traumatized siblings coping with their past in different ways. The last part rings true in some way, but the first part is highly unimaginative, crude, and — thankfully — bullshit. Blurbs usually do their best to convey stereotypes to sell a book (we recognize the familiar), in this case successfully. I readColm Tóibín’s short story in The Book of other People, which I really liked, so I wanted to read one of his books. A bargain box at the local bookseller’s gave me the perfect opportunity to do so when I found a copy of The Blackwater Lightship.
[FYI: This review contains spoilers.]
Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose…
Helen’s little brother Declan is dying of AIDS. Assisted by his two close friends Larry and Paul, he spends a few days with his mother and sister at their grandmother’s place, an old house close to the sea. The arrival of three gay men — one of them her beloved grandson — is reason enough to shake up Dora’s world. Nevertheless, this does not mean we meet the average old lady harboring prejudices against homosexuals; Dora is full of prejudices and resentment, so Declan’s friends are just the icing on the cake, at least in the beginning.
Dora adapts to the grave situation — Declan being seriously ill and dying — fast and seems to cope relatively well with the coming developments; mind you, the emphasis is on ‘seems.’ For Declan’s mother Lily and his sister Helen, the situation is more difficult, since their relationship is strained at best. Meeting again after years of hardly any contact in the light of something as grave as the son/brother dying is a challenge on multiple levels.
“And why is it that he sent you to tell me?”
Helen stared at the road ahead. When she saw a double-decker bus, she thought about asking her mother to make her own way to the hospital, but it was a thought that she did not entertain for long. She softened and tried to imagine what it must be like for her.
“I think he felt that at a time like this we would all forget our differences,” Helen said.
“Well, I don’t notice any difference in you”, her mother said.
“Bear with me, I’m making an effort,” Helen said. She could not keep the dry tone out of her voice.
Friends are family
None of the three women knew about Declan’s illness. Especially Lily feels left out after realizing that Declan’s friends, in particular Paul, know much more about his health and how to deal with his illness than any of his family, having accompanied him through the various stages of his HIV infection over the years. This adds to the growing irritation between the family and also Declan’s friends.
Our main protagonist is Helen; though it’s a third-person-narration, the focus lies on her, her history, her issues, and her incapability to deal with her past. We also learn more about Paul, Declan’s friend, who never leaves his side and is the main force regarding his care (much to Lily’s chagrin). Apart from those two everyone else rather seems to set the stage for Helen and the family’s difficult past — at least this is how I felt. Since this structure worked well for me, I loved it.
First, when looking back on her past, Helen does not face a ‘huge trauma’ in the stereotypical way of trauma, meaning abuse and violence or the like. Her turning point was the death of her beloved father when she was 12. Much of what follows afterwards are conflicts that could happen in any other family as well — generational conflicts, emotional trauma, hurt feelings, broken promises. So while Helen’s inner (and outer) conflicts are understandable, one does not have to be awestruck how one person can go on with her life in the light of a past as gruesome as hers.
Second, Paul is wonderful. There’s no other way for me to describe this character. He is a compassionate, caring, and thoughtful person, the best friend one can have in general and in Declan’s situation in particular. Fiercely protective of his dying friend, he does his best to handle the situation respectfully.
Never lose hope
Larry, Dora, Lily, and Declan add their own stories about their lives, families, hopes, and failures. Doing so, the novel tells a difficult and sad story that will have no happy ending, but at least a hopeful one. A sort of hope that leaves us in a bittersweet mood, more positive than negative, more open than just plain sad.
I read this book in two days, and it only took THAT LONG because I needed some sleep. Colm Tóibín is a wonderful narrator, his stories create a particular atmosphere I cannot specify, but I feel it whenever I read one of his books. Nora Webster is already waiting, but I will take a little break before my next Tóibín. It’s an intensive and wonderful reading experience, one I cannot and won’t take lightly, for the best possible reasons.