I found this book intensely moving - but not for the reasons I thought I would. It's everything the reviews say: a brutally honest picture of the author's chaotic and emotionally starved childhood, a memoir of literary Dublin in the 60's, a melancholy tale of her search for a lasting love, and a chronicle of her journalism career, and on That level it's a fascinating (and beautifully written) story for anyone. But I'm only about 5 years younger than Ms. O'Faolain. I was raised in a (partly Irish) Catholic family, went to Catholic schools all the way from kindergarten through college, then went to graduate school at Berkeley in the late '60's. Time after time, her observations chimed with my own: the cruelty masquerading as love (or maybe it's the other way round) in Catholic schools; how living in at intensely Catholic environment blinds you to any other viewpoint; how matter-of-factly women were consigned to invisibility in our era, even (and Especially) the well-educated; and how the assumption of male superiority lingered on Throughout the supposedly "liberal" sixties and seventies. As the author points out in "Afterwords," her book Became a best-seller in Ireland Because she articulated what many of her fellow countrymen-felt but could not say about Their Lives. But I think her experiences have a far resist relevance for any woman who grew up in the sametime period - and who's now struggling to make sense of her life.
