A Tale of Passivity and Longing: Colm Tóibín’s Long Island (2024)
Contains spoilers!
What happens after ‘happily ever after’, when the ring is on the finger, when the decision is made?
Tóibín immediately shatters the peace of Eilis and Tony’s happily ever after, twenty years after the events in Brooklyn. A man bangs on the door, and Eilis answers. The man says Tony’s plumbing is good, a little too good - his wife is pregnant with Tony’s child.
Up until this point, from her thoughts and sly humour, we know that life in Long Island has been stifling for Eilis. With two teenage children - Larry and Rosella -Eilis and Tony have created what some would call the ideal family. Eilis lives in close proximity to her in-laws, and despite having lived in America for twenty years, we get the impression that she is still an outsider. In the first twenty or so pages, it becomes apparent that Eilis is lonely. The shocking news of Tony’s infidelity marks the end of Ellis’s life as she knew it, the happily ever after chapter comes to a close. Now, Eilis must decide what she wants from this new chapter of her life. Seeking comfort, Eilis returns to Ireland.
Enniscorthy is the same as it was when Eilis left twenty years ago; everyone knows everyone’s business, nothing is secret, and the town feels as cramped as it ever did. Her mother, set in her ways, refuses the glossy new appliances Eilis offers her, refusing to be brought into the present. Quiet Jim Farrell runs the local pub, and Eilis’ best friend Nancy is a widow of five years, now running a chip shop, much to the town’s people’s dismay.
What I found notable is how Eilis has grown more self-assured since Brooklyn. When we see things from her perspective, it is evident that she knows her own mind, and is more comfortable using her voice. She has grown from girl into woman. Notably, we aren’t only in Eilis’s head for the duration of the book, we also see things through Jim and Nancy’s eyes respectively.
The plot unfolds over a string of mundane events; shopping, beach walks, and a wedding provide the ground on which the subtle story develops. This is where Tóibín’s mastery comes in: within the quiet subtlety of the every day, we explore the complexity of ‘the road not taken’. ‘What if?’ is a prominent question, threaded throughout the book. This is a story about what could have been, not necessarily what should have been.
A longing for the past is a key aspect of each of the characters. Eilis and Jim are thrust into wondering what could have been, struggling to ask one another how events transpired. Passivity is a crucial aspect of this. It becomes apparent that passivity is to blame for Eilis leaving in the first place. For Jim, readers become aware of how he has allowed for life to pass him by. For Eilis, there is almost some kind of relief that she can escape her current life, forcing her out of docile domesticity. I found myself increasingly frustrated when the characters wouldn’t just say what they were thinking. The dialogue is tactical and intelligent, conveying the chasm between what we think, and what we end up saying.
Sequels are a slippery slope; it seems all too easy to leave the couple frozen in their happiness. But Tóibín masterfully explores the human condition, nostalgia, and life itself through these intricate characters and the continuation of their lives. I must say, I was heartbroken after reading the first few pages, thinking ‘surely not’, but, as long time friends of Eilis, we must feel her heartache, her disappointment, and uncertainty for her future. The characters are uniquely well-rounded; it feels like coming home to old friends. You feel their longing for the past, you feel the weight of the decisions they must make, but you also feel their hope.