I’m never not going to be a Sally Rooney girl
Oh you’re a sad lit girl? Yes, let's have a party. Yes, let's call Sally Rooney
**DISCLAIMER: This is not an Intermezzo review. I have not read Intermezzo yet. I got my copy yesterday, like a commoner, and so I will be starting it this evening, in a hot bath, with a sweet treat, as we all should.**
When Beautiful World Where Are You, came out, I was living in London. I had just started what would become a terrible, terrible relationship with a boy I was completely infatuated with.
I remember the photo he sent me of the copy he secured at Waterloo Station on his way to work. I remember lying on his chest and talking about the prose style, and whether the emails worked as a literary device (they do). I remember comparing where we were each up to over the phone on nights he was away. I remember eating Sunday dinner by the river and telling him I still thought Normal People was my favourite.
I also remember seeing us — him and me as we were together — in everything Rooney wrote. When we miscommunicated, we were Connell and Marianne. When we fought, endless screaming matches that he’d apologise for later, we were Frances and Nick. We were all of them at different points, Alex and Felix, Eileen and Simon. At one point we were Marianne and Jamie.
Ridiculous, given they all have a wildly different dynamic and set of circumstances. I know this. But it was the kind of relationship that dragged me so pathetically far into its centre that I saw us everywhere I looked. In characters, in songs, in myths, even. But nowhere more than in the Rooney-verse — because everything is beautiful and sad in the Rooney-verse. And I was telling myself we were beautiful and sad at the time.
Throughout the relatively short relationship, we were intense and dramatic. We spent a lot of time drinking red wine and telling each other how much we loved each other and how angry we made each other and how novel-worthy our relationship was — all while saying absolutely none of the things that people actually said in normal, healthy relationships.
Now, I’ve grown out of that phase. Today, I recognise the red flags in relationships where you haven’t actually sat down and watched a Netflix series together at any point, but you have planned matching tattoos.
I’ve grown out of wanting painful, tortured love as written by Sally Rooney. But I will never, ever grow out of wanting to read about painful, tortured love as written by Sally Rooney.
In fact, of all the things I once associated with that specific, terrible time, Sally Rooney books are the only thing that haven’t been completely ruined for me. Why? Because she’s a higher power. Because it’s one of the rare things I loved back then that I loved for me. Because I will always, always be a Sally Rooney girl.
Despite her popularity (happy Intermezzo week to all who celebrate, did you get an ARC by the way? I didn’t), Rooney gets a lot of criticism. This criticism often pushes around the idea that nothing much actually happens in her books, or that it’s all just a lot of selfish, privileged white people sitting around complaining…
To say nothing happens in Sally Rooney books, for me, however, is to say that you don’t want to dig too far into your literature as you read it. And that’s fine. There are plenty of books (all works of art in their own right; I’m not hating here) that are much more plot-driven that you can enjoy. But, while you’re doing that, let the girlies that want to read about angsty women who do very little but smoke cigarettes and think about the deeper meaning of life have their moment, too.
Also… So.much.happens. People have epiphanies. People repeat old habits. People discover things about themselves based on the way they let others treat them. People cheat. People lie. People live gloriously mundane lives — and we can all find something in it to relate to.
It’s hard to ignore the idea that a lot of Rooney criticism comes rooted in the fact that her novels are beloved predominantly (not entirely) by girls. And the more an author or director or songwriter or whatever else is loved by predominantly by girls, the more tempting it is to dismiss them as ‘less than’. Look at Taylor Swift, look at Barbie’s Oscars snub, look at online disdain for romance novels in general…
For me, there is nothing “less than” about this work. Rooney writes for the people who are just as deep as the characters in her novels are. She writes for the people who won’t ever make the mistakes Frances does in Conversations with Friends, but who understand the kind of complex feelings that could push a person towards them. She writes for the people who feel lost, but don’t quite know why. She writes for people who love words.
And she does it well. Watching Rooney take her place as queen of the literary sad girls, I realised I want to write like she does. Not in a plagiarism way, but in a ‘capturing the extremes of the human personality in a completely everyday setting’ way.
I still see myself in her characters. In fact, I’m going to risk a sweeping statement in saying I think most of the people who love Rooney’s novels do. Yes, they’re all more dramatic and sexy and addicted to nicotine than most of us are in real life, and they’ve definitely all got more going on than I have (and I mean that in the best way, because I am a grown-up woman and I protect my peace better than that now). But I still see the things I want to see.
And even if Intermezzo is completely different, I’m sure I’ll see something of myself in that, too.
But I’ll report back either way…
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6.00am: my alarm goes off for Hot Yoga. This year I’ve been experimenting with becoming insufferable, and for a while it was starting to stick. There was a point where I regularly made 3 early yoga classes a week while also training for a half-marathon. Like all the most powerful regimes, however, mine was fragile and easily toppled. It took a minor run…
Loved this piece! Think you hit on all the right points about why Sally Rooney (and other female authors/artists, like Françoise Sagan, Deborah Levy, etc) is so beloved by women: because she tells OUR stories—the ones that get little fanfare, the ones that we think don’t really matter, because they’re part of our every day. :) lots of love from London!!
I enjoyed this. Especially how you put it this way: "Also… So.much.happens. People have epiphanies. People repeat old habits. People discover things about themselves based on the way they let others treat them. People cheat. People lie. People live gloriously mundane lives — and we can all find something in it to relate to."