Review of THE YEAR OF THE FRENCH
A 1979 historical fiction classic ... rediscovered & remarkable
Thomas Flanagan wrote this masterpiece of historical fiction after leaving academia at 58 years of age. Not dissimilar to Norman Maclean and A River Runs Through It, this book was clearly gestating for a lifetime in the mind – clearly a brilliant one at that – of Thomas Flanagan. It would be the first in a trilogy that sweeps through late 18th and 19th century Irish history but it is clearly his masterpiece. Newly reissued by the always interesting NYRB publishing house, I feel that Flanagan is going to be rediscovered along the lines of John Williams and his three near perfect novels: Stoner, Butcher’s Crossing and Augustus (more on Williams later).
I stumbled into the book thanks to a good friend in Seattle and a mention by Jill Lepore. I sought out an old, slightly beat-up original hardback edition after struggling with the small print of the newly issued paperback. I later learned that this book was a huge critical success and that it was soon made into a popular mini-series that attracted a fair amount of controversy circling around where its sympathies lay. I wonder if its relative disappearance was in part to its unfortunate television notoriety or that it is long, complex and resistant to encapsulation.
The closest I can get to a big picture statement might be that this is a book about History first and foremost. Not just the tortured history of Ireland or the equally fraught history of English/Irish relations or the fratricidal hell of Catholic versus Protestant Ireland or even its deft treatment of the French Revolution. All of that is there but the real story that drives all of that is History itself. The Irish write poems and compose songs about their real and imagined history but seem to learn next to nothing from it. The English assume they are simply a part of the great march of history and are determined to be its great benefactor. The French are trying to reverse the course of history. All the while, History lands on the shores of a grim little town on the coast of County Mayo and tragedy unfurls as inevitably as the great green flag that lead the Irish peasants to the end of British bayonets.
The story is told, like history itself, from a multitude of points of view. Each one is credible in its own way. The shifting points of view create a Venn diagram of overlapping stories as we learn in glimpses from differing voices the fate of the book’s dozens of characters. In the midst of it is a womanizing, utterly absorbing alcoholic poet whose love of women, words and whiskey mirror the tragic weakness and charm of the Irish mind. The dialogue is extensive, circular and vivid. It feels like you are in the room, on the road, or in the tavern and though much gets repeated in different ways, it remains all of a piece.
There are very few books I have enjoyed reading more. It is operatic, intimate and profound. I hated to finish it.
The Year of the French
By Thomas Flanagan (2004)
544 pages