Heart Be at Peace
I’ve been thinking about what it means to not just live — but to cultivate, and maybe even cultivate with aplomb (!) — a small life. Which mine is. And I suspect that applies to the great majority of us. I think there are two hurdles here: One is the understanding that one is merely a speck in the endlessness of history. (Btw, read Orbital for some awesome prose about that notion.) The second thing to overcome can be harder, and that is fostering a genuine satisfaction with the minuscule — and maybe even undetectable — ways that we go about our not-very-important business. I mean, it’s likely not very important…because what *really* constitutes “important”? (Figuring out that last part is, I think, something that stops a lot of us in our mental tracks.)
In Heart Be at Peace, a novel partly about solipsism (yup, that word is used by a character) and how we perceive others, the story of how a village near Limerick grapples with “progress” is explored in 21 chapters, each narrated by a different character. Maybe one strives for a big life, but the danger is being forced into a big life for the wrong reasons. In Donal Ryan’s seventh novel, that could be: an unintentional visit with a prostitute in Amsterdam that is caught on camera and WhatsApp’d around town, your part in the kidnapping of a child from the crèche that employs you, or maybe something as simple as being seen as a big shot. Drugs and the luxury vehicles that seem to accompany them point to a big life and are referenced in nearly every chapter. Better to be small than risk being known for the wrong reasons?
Donal Ryan doesn’t get enough attention in the US, which actually seems a weirdly fitting thought…is he not “big” enough? Speaking of “small life” and Donal Ryan: In 2017, an Irish Times article made quite a splash, as Ryan explained that despite having several bestsellers/prize-winning novels, he was forced to return to his civil service job because “I reckon I get about 40c per book.” A reminder that big accomplishments are rarely lauded the way they might deserve. And that the things we perceive as “big” might be…kinda meh.
originally published on instagram