Down a Blue Road
A review of the Back Bay Books paperback (May 6, 2014) of the Faber & Faber hardcover (October 4, 2012).

I saw the World Premiere of the documentary film Blue Road: The Edna O'Brien Story at the 2024 Toronto International Film Festival and found it to be wonderful encapsulation of the Irish writer's life story. O'Brien did not get to see the completed film but had provided several filmed interviews for it before her final illness and passing on July 27, 2024. I had the book in hand as well, but didn't get a chance to finish it until now.

I previously only knew Edna O'Brien's (1930-2024) writing from her first book The Country Girls (1960). Although it was a breakthrough novel at the time of release, it also met with book banning, burning and condemnation in its native Ireland due to its frank depictions of female sexual desire and its mockery of the Catholic Church. Her further success as a writer brought conflict into her marriage with failed novelist Ernest Gébler, eventually leading to their separation and divorce.

Her later independent life in London reads like a whirlwind jaunt through the Swinging Sixties and afterwards. There is a considerable amount of name-checking and funny anecdotes throughout the book about the various celebrities she met and entertained at parties. There are background stories to the later novels and her other writing of plays and screenplays. There is the rather wonderful quirky encounter with later crime & mystery writer Walter Mosley whom O'Brien mentored in a writing course back in the day. Mosley tells the story in the film as well.

See photograph at https://www.irishcentral.com/uploads/article/9673/cropped_edna_obrien___getty.jp...
Edna O'Brien in the early years of her career. Image sourced from IrishCentral.com.

Why not a 5-star? The book perhaps rather fizzles out in the end, stopping in 2012 when O'Brien still had further years of writing ahead. The final section talking about Werner Herzog's film Cave of Forgotten Dreams (2010) didn't provide a proper sense of closure. That impression of non-closure was probably due to my having seen the film which showed O'Brien in her later years and her funeral on Inis Cealtra (Holy Island) off the coast of Ireland.

While on the road in September and October 2024, I also toggled reading the paperback with listening to the audiobook which was read by the author herself.

Trivia and Links
The various obituaries provide an overview of Edna O'Brien's life and career. You can read some of them at The Irish Times, The BBC and The Guardian.

There is a short documentary film about Edna O'Brien's funeral and burial which you can see on YouTube here. ( )

Because I have never read any of her other books, I am not really sure why I read Edna O'Brien's memoir. It was a mixed experience, I don't enjoy reading about all the famous people memoirists meet at parties as a rule. There were portions of this book that drew me in, though, despite the luminaries mentioned. One charming story was her encounter with Marlon Brando. I also enjoyed her pride in her sons and her successful struggle to gain custody when her marriage failed. ( )

The New York Times book section ran a feature this week on the best memoirs of the past 50 years, and this was one that jumped out at me, so I read it. I will read any ‘60’s London party girl literary memoir, because of the high likelihood of appearances by Richard Burton, Princess Margaret, Roger Vadim, Robert Mitchum, and Harold Pinter. She delivers. Philip Roth and Jacqueline Onassis are bonuses. ( )

The autobiography of Irish novelist Edna O’brien. The story of her relationship with her parents, the Roman Catholic Church, her marriage and how she began to write. It also recounts her life in London. Vivid, memorable, as all her books are. ( )

I thought parts of the book were truly splendid and some parts were completely tedious. it was one of those books that feels like a huge weight lifted off your shoulder when it is finished. ( )