They’re great, those other writers — but they’re not Sally Rooney

LET us pause this morning to remember all the Irish novelists of recent times who have done good work, but who are not Sally Rooney.

They did nothing wrong, some of them did a lot of things right, but they are not Sally Rooney.

It is very hard to write a very good book, and even harder to see it selling 16 copies worldwide, for no specific reason except that somehow it did not catch the wave, as Normal People did — it didn’t catch anything, really, except maybe a few kind words from a reviewer that the author knew in college.

Indeed there are probably a few very decent novels written during the past 20 years or so, about people who knew one another in college — but they weren’t written by Sally Rooney, they didn’t get millions of viewers for a gorgeous TV treatment by Lenny Abrahamson, the gods did not smile on them. Indeed the gods did not see them there at all.

I think too of the creative ambitions of some of these writers, their experiments in fiction — maybe they wanted to get away from the familiar themes, or do something of great stylistic originality like Mike McCormack, with his novel that consists entirely of one sentence.

But maybe they were just too experimental, or not experimental enough — maybe in the end it’s just that they weren’t Sally Rooney, who could probably have written anything, but who struck the motherlode with... a love story about a boy and a girl.

They thought that stuff was all over, until Rooney showed it had hardly even started yet — a love story about a boy and a girl.

OK, there was the bit of sado-masochism, up in Sweden, but you’ll get that too.

*******

And so the games come, like rain on parched earth.

When the Premier League starts again, hopefully on Wednesday, June 17, at times there will be four games a day, some of them on BBC television. All of them on some sort of television that is accessible to viewers in the ROI.

And so the games come… like rain… on parched earth.

You need to say this out loud, ideally in the voice of a narrator of a film about the Mojave Desert, who himself is trying to sound noble and profound and elemental.

“Like rain… on parched… earth…”

With Liverpool leading by 25 points, some of the most intense contests will feature the many viewers who are involved in their fantasy leagues, a cohort which has been largely neglected in our public health information campaigns.

I may have missed it, but at no point did I hear the eminent virologist Dr Cillian de Gascun asking us to spare a thought for the fantasy footballers at this difficult time — though “Gazza’s” own Twitter profile says he is a “sports fan (United, Leinster, Bears, Bulls)”.

Nor have I heard anyone empathising with them as they face the challenge of trying to maintain their pre-pandemic fantasy form under a whole new set of playing conditions — will, say, Gini Wijnaldum be getting as many “assists” when it’s all behind closed doors?

It’s a great question… as the games come… like rain…