Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #7052 in Books
• Published on: 2006-04-06
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 292 pages

Independent
'Unsurpassed in First World War fiction, A Long Long Way is a small masterpiece with an exhilarating resoluteness and authority.'

Sunday Times
'A beautifully written book with human value.'

The Times
'The story grips, shocks and saddens; but most importantly refuses to be forgotten.'

Customer Reviews

One dimensional, utterly romanticised characters
It should be more widely known that between 250,000 and 300,000 Irishmen fought with the British army in WWI alone and at least a further 100,000 in WWII. What with our dubiously "glorious" nationalist tradition in Ireland, we do not like to admit the extent of allegiance that there was to the crown and that when it mattered, there was no question but that we would fight on the side of civilisation and of Britain. Today, our Irish veterans are ignored by their Government and it is sad to say, countrymen. In 2005 the remaining living Irish D-Day veterans turned up at the Garden of Remembrance for the 60th anniversary commemoration. Apparently, not one representative of the Irish Government was there. What a shameful episode. All the surviving British, Irish and commonwealth soldiers of D-Day are heroes plain and simple and this does not brook any argument or dispute whatsoever. If in doubt, watch Saving Private Ryan.

I am surprised that this book made it to the Booker short list in 2005. I can only say that it must be because of the originality of its subject matter i.e. a fictitious account of the Irish experience in Flanders' trenches during the Great War. It is a story not so far told, as far as I am aware.

The hero of the book, Willie Dunne, is the son of a "castle Catholic" very reminiscent of the main character in Barry's wonderful play The Steward of Christendom. At five foot six Dunne, is way too short of the regulation height of six feet to join the Dublin metropolitan police force like his father (a giant of six feet six as it happens). So, Willie goes to fight for the British army with an Irish regiment in Flanders. There he meets a motley bunch of lads from the different counties of Ireland, many from the Leinster counties of Meath, Wicklow, Kildare and Wexford. On a leave of absence back in Dublin, he stumbles in to the midst of the 1916 rising in Dublin City Centre - which is a particularly well written portion of the novel. It is now that Willie Dunne begins to think about who and what he is fighting for and begins to have divided loyalties. For his father however, things were always clear cut - he is loyal to King George and the Empire. As a depiction of the horrors of war and World War I in particular, the novel is exemplary. The most vivid and terrifying scenes are of German mustard gas attacks and these are brilliantly written, as are the instances of the blood imagery. Overall however, this novel loses too many marks for me because the characters are very cardboard cut out and one dimensional. Willie, the hero is not only ridiculously pure as the driven snow, but one of the most naïve and just plain stupid characters I have read in fiction. Nearly all the Irish soldiers are good, decent honest lads - not a bad bone in any one of them. They are terrifically romanticised and just not at all convincing. The English are not painted too sympathetically at all because Barry focuses only on the top brass. Having said that, the English officer Stokes is memorable as a sociopath whose mind has clearly departed in to the realms of blackest black. This book was unanimously lauded as a masterpiece by all the critics on RTE's culture show "The View". That left me baffled I have to say.

The Western Front merges with the Irish Front
This book will stay with you a long long time. Sebastian Barry writes so beautifully about such a terrible subject, from the gas clouds floating over the trenches to the civil unrest brewing in Dublin. Willie is touched by the rebels plight when he holds a dying young rebel on the Dublin streets, during one of his rare furloughs from the Belgian battlefields. The particular tragedy of the Irish fighting for King and Country, while some of their countrymen were fighting against that same king, adds a further dimension to the whole tragedy of the First World War.

A Long Long Way To Find A Better Novel
I cannot recommend this novel highly enough.

I believe it embodies the very best qualities of prose fiction: character-driven plot, poignancy, moral questions, the creation of a world of heartbreak wherein the reader grasps at little moments of humour and joy, cinematic graphic description, and language that makes you read whole sentences aloud just to hold onto the words.

The novel is about Irish soldiers, but it is really about humans and what we allow them to experience in our name.