{"id":442749,"date":"2026-05-11T05:59:32","date_gmt":"2026-05-11T05:59:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/442749\/"},"modified":"2026-05-11T05:59:32","modified_gmt":"2026-05-11T05:59:32","slug":"elizabeth-strout-has-written-the-great-american-novel","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/442749\/","title":{"rendered":"Elizabeth Strout has written the Great American novel"},"content":{"rendered":"

To read Elizabeth Strout<\/a> is to be reassured that the US is not entirely mad, bad and dangerous.<\/p>\n

Over the course of 11 novels, she has become perhaps the single best chronicler of a very particular kind of American life, her books filled with a homely, apple-pie sweetness that conjures a sense of white picket fences.<\/p>\n

Behind this fa\u00e7ade things may well be falling apart, but everyone ultimately remains decent, even if some of her recurring cast of characters tend towards the irritable \u2013 in particular, the magnificent grump Olive Kitteridge, star of two of her books to date, and with cameo appearances<\/a> in at least two more.<\/p>\n

You would never confuse Strout\u2019s style with that of other serious American novelists \u2013 Don DeLillo<\/a>, say, or Jonathan Franzen<\/a> \u2013 but they nevertheless deal in the same preoccupations: how to live side-by-side on an increasingly complicated planet, and still find succour. Unlike those (male) writers, however, whose books \u2013 brilliant as they may be \u2013 require the reader to wade through at least 600 pages, Strout manages similar with remarkable economy, and no scrimping on impact. You could read this during your daily commute, though be prepared to be profoundly affected if you do.<\/p>\n

She has produced novels that do this since her 1998 debut Amy and Isabelle, about a complex mother\/daughter relationship, but with her new novel The Things We Never Say, she steps out of her comfort zone, at least a little.<\/p>\n

For the first time in a long time, the book does not feature familiar faces (although Olive is referenced in passing, Strout unable to resist the temptation), nor is it set in her usual milieu of Maine, but rather Massachusetts. Not a huge leap, admittedly, but still. It\u2019s also her darkest book by far. Within its slender 203 pages, she unleashes nothing less than a prolonged howl of despair over the current state of the world.<\/p>\n

\"ActressFrances McDormand in the TV adaptation of \u2018Olive Kitteridge\u2019 in 2014 (Photo: Jojo Whilden\/HBO)<\/p>\n

Artie Dam is a high school history teacher whose enthusiasm for his subject makes him popular even among those pupils who rarely glance up from their phones. He is married to Evie, his wife of many years, with whom he has a grown-up son. At the weekends, Artie likes to take his sailing boat out on the bay for a bit of R&R. Despite this seemingly charmed life, Artie has fallen into a deep depression. He is, quite literally, losing the will to live. The US\u2019s ongoing political situation has hardly helped.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe dread of the upcoming presidential election [made] him feel as if a noose was tightening around his neck,\u201d Strout writes. \u201cWhat a hell of a mess this country is headed for. And all we are doing is just standing around fiddling while Rome burns.\u201d<\/p>\n

He tries to talk to his wife about his concerns, but Evie has her own preoccupations. \u201cHe had seen it in her eyes \u2013 after their being married for so many years \u2013 that she was no longer interested.\u201d<\/p>\n

Quietly, because Artie isn\u2019t the type to bother folk, he decides to kill himself. Luck is on his side. While sailing his boat in the bay one day, he falls into the water, but is surprised to find that survival instinct forces him to swim, not sink. <\/p>\n

When someone comes to his aid, another middle-aged man with reasons for his own lethargy, they become firm friends, both hoping that in each other they might vanquish loneliness. Loneliness, Artie believes, is our inescapable fate. \u201cWhy don\u2019t people ever say anything real? Because nobody wanted to know. It was a private thing, to be alive. He understood this now.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

In many ways, The Things We Never Say is quintessential Strout. Like 2016\u2019s My Name Is Lucy Barton<\/a> and 2021\u2019s Oh William!<\/a>, which also gently grappled with existential themes, it is sad but lovely, full of appealing characters and of neighbours being neighbourly while trading in the kind of gossipy asides that require exclamation marks.<\/p>\n

While it is true to say that the old-fashioned way in which she writes tends to bleed into her characters\u2019 personalities, and render them similarly antiquated \u2013 Artie, for example, is just 57, but the way Strout dresses him and has him behave makes him seem closer to 77 \u2013 she is also unafraid to excavate the deepest of feelings, where true darkness lies.<\/p>\n

Everyone surrounding Artie is comparably adrift: colleagues, neighbours, his students. Clearly, these are hard times. Suicide exists both as ideation and as a necessary obligation for those who feel they can no longer exist in a world gone irrevocably bad, exacerbated, each believes, by the president and his enablers. (While Trump is never mentioned by name, he suffuses every page of a book that might not find favour with Maga.)<\/p>\n

If all this makes The Things We Never Say sound overwhelmingly bleak, then, well, it is. But it is also radiant with hope, with empathy, a plea for kindness and understanding \u2013 those little things that really do count. The scene in which Artie, increasingly lost, finds himself shoplifting is the most moving thing that I, personally, have read in fiction in a long time. Strout can break your heart, then put it back together again.<\/p>\n

Later, a student tells Artie of her optimism, despite everything. \u201cI know this sounds stupid, but I want to help people. I hope there can be world peace, and I want to do my part.\u201d<\/p>\n

This could feel a little trite coming from a lesser author, but such is the tightrope Elizabeth Strout walks. Despite her perpetual air of genteel timidity, she\u2019s a fearless writer.<\/p>\n

Those who crave literature that offers even a glimmer of light at the end of a tunnel strewn with bin fires need look no further. At 70 years old, this quiet marvel has just delivered her masterpiece \u2013 one in which she skewers modern America more powerfully, and certainly more succinctly, than any of her peers.<\/p>\n

\u2018The Things We Never Say\u2019 by Elizabeth Strout is published by Viking, \u00a318.99<\/p>\n

For confidential support, Samaritans are available 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Call for free on 116 123 or visit samaritans.org<\/a> <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"To read Elizabeth Strout is to be reassured that the US is not entirely mad, bad and dangerous.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":442750,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[192806,121458,93,61,60],"class_list":["post-442749","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-books-feature","tag-elizabeth-strout","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442749","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=442749"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/442749\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/442750"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=442749"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=442749"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=442749"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}