Essays Flashcards
Brooklyn is about the liberation of women in a patriarchal world. Discuss.
Brooklyn is about the limits imposed on change and liberation by the society we are confined to.
Para 1 – liberation/growth in sexual capital and freedom
Para 2 – limits to the liberation of women
Para 2 – limits to personal growth in agency and emotional expression
“Brooklyn changes every day” In what way is Brooklyn a novel about change?
Brooklyn is a novel about the ways in which we must adapt in order to survive, but also about the limits which are imposed on our growth by society.
Para 1 – personal change/adaptation
Para 2 – generational growth and need for progressive attitudes
Para 3 – limits to personal growth in agency and emotional expression due to society and fear
Eilis doesn’t look for freedom and opportunity, but they find her anyway. Discuss.
Because Eilis is too afraid of conflict to challenge the barriers imposed on her growth by society, the freedom and opportunity that she unwittingly finds are contained within the barriers of what is permissible by the society of her time.
Para 1 –fear of conflict is stronger than her desire to grow
Para 2 – expanded freedom and opportunity through the need to adapt to the conditions of Brooklyn
Para 3 – freedom and opportunity contained by role of women in Brooklyn society and the need to conform to societal standards
Eilis passivity prevents her from living the life she really wants. Discuss
Toibin explores the ways in which the passivity that springs from a reluctance to make decisions contains the opportunities open to individuals within the barriers imposed by society. This reluctance is portrayed as a product of the longing individuals have for unattainable ideals, which drives them to avoid making choices in order to mitigate the effect of harsh reality on their idealised desires.
Para 1 – passivity prevents from growing outside the confines of female role
Para 2 – the life she really wants is unattainable, because she constantly idealises the ‘other’
- Home
- Rose
- Windows
Para 3 – the idealistic nature of our desires leads to a passivity and inability to express our true self and strive for what we really want to
- Doesn’t want to break ‘home’ ideal, leads to duplitious nature and pain
- Can’t break ideal of ‘perfect family’, leads to emotional repression “almost smiled”
- Womanly role, miss fortini, Eilis working
Is society to blame for Eilis Lacey’s troubles in ‘Brooklyn’?
The susceptibility of individuals to strive for unattainable ideals and therefore bind themselves to passivity is what causes the conflicts Eilis faces.
Para 1 – she is bound by what society expects of her; leads to conflict between dual selves
Para 2 – her passivity is what causes her to remain within the confines of society, as she is too afraid to challenge the role defined for her
Para 3 – this passivity stems from her need to strive for unattainable ideals
Place is central to person in ‘Brooklyn’. Discuss.
Place both develops our identity and reflects it.
Para 1 – forms dual identity through adaptation to the environment
Para 2 – perception reflects identity
Para 3 – place reflects global shift
What reasons does Eilis have to feel like a ghost in ‘Brooklyn’
Toibin explores the complex relationship between migration and belonging, positing that the loss of belonging causes individuals to lose their identity
Para 1 – identity tied to place; loses it
Para 2 – relationship connections enable her to regain some belonging
Para 3 – unable to ever truly feel at home due to home being an unattainable ideal (home = childhood, passivity, no need to make decisions?)
For the Irish migration is a painful experience
Toibin shows migration as an experience that can bring both pain and renewal.
Para 1 – national loss and regret of those left behind
Para 2 – loss of self and idealised expectations
Para 3 – migration can bring individual and generational growth through adaptation
Brooklyn is at heart a coming-of-age novel
Brooklyn is a novel about the consequences of refusing to come of age.
Para 1 – some growth in order to belong
Para 2 – seeks to maintain her infantilism by not making decisions
Para 3 – Toibin condemns individuals who let their choices be guided by others
Eilis finally comes to terms with “the life she had lost and would never have again”. Do you agree?
Eilis is never able to fully abandon her longing for the unattainable ideal of a home where she is again able to be a child.
Para 1 – is able to find some belonging in Brooklyn
Para 2 – slips into her old life to avoid confrontation/regain sense of being a child
Para 3 – “the life she has lost” is that of a child who does not have to make decisions, doesn’t come to terms with his
It is the past that is a “terrible weight” in Brooklyn
Letting go of childhood in favour of an adulthood of agency and opportunity is a “terrible weight”
Para 1 – identity tied up with place; losing it is a terrible weight
Para 2 – sense of duty to family is terrible weight
Para 3 – this sense of duty is however simply an expression of the childhood Eilis has lost; this infantile identity is what causes her feeling of loss
Both America and Ireland are shown to have their freedoms and restrictions
Toibin suggests that society will always impose some limits on the growth of individual, with the twin societies serving as microcosms of the shifting world order of the 1950s. However, the freedoms and restrictions that individuals are allowed stem not only from the nature of the society they find themselves in but their personal relationship with these places.
Para 1 – growth limited in scope by society; shifts in different places; role of women
Para 2 – America brings greater freedom due to rise of consumerism and progressive societal values, but this modernity comes with drawbacks
Para 3 – the freedoms individuals can experience in any society are defined by their relationships
In ‘Brooklyn’, life’s decisions are complex, with no right answers
There is an initial sense of moral ambiguity about the decisions of individuals in Brooklyn – ultimately, however, Toibin condemns those who allow their life’s decisions to be made by others.
Para 1 – Brooklyn acknowledges that the decisions we make are nuanced
Para 2 – When decisions are complex, it can be tempting to let other make them for us
Para 3 – Toibin condemns this, demonstrating how it leads to pain for those involved
The real failing of the characters in Brooklyn is a failure to communicate
The real failing of the characters in Brooklyn is a longing for an unattainable ideal, from whence stem other issues such as their failure to communicate.
Para 1 – failure to communicate leads to others making your decisions for you
Para 2 – failure to communicate stems from a reluctance to make your own decisions and take agency
Para 3 – this reluctance to make decisions springs from the desire to maintain or reach an unattainable ideal
Eilis is Brooklyn’s protagonist, but is she a heroine?
Eilis is a vehicle through which Toibin condemns those who let their life be guided by unattainable ideals and therefore fall prey to passivity and emotional repression.
Para 1 – Individuals grow within the confines of their society
Para 2 – When we strive to maintain or reach an unattainable ideal, we paralyse ourselves into indecision, and others make our decisions for us
Para 3 – this leads to pain and conflict
Brooklyn places responsibility to self above responsibility to others
Brooklyn shows the negative consequences of placing duty to others above your responsibility to yourself, condemning those who do so. However, it simultaneously acknowledges that it is impossible for individuals to abandon their responsibilities to society without losing their belonging.
Para 1 – submitting to the wishes of others may simply be a way of keeping your responsibility to yourself
Para 2 – doing this leads to pain and conflict
Para 3 – maintaining some responsibility to others, even if it is a way of shielding yourself from the need to take agency, results in being able to function effectively in society
How does Toibin convey a sense of divided loyalty in Brooklyn?
Para 1 – our environment forms our identity; therefore, the migration experience results in a division of self and thus a division of loyalty – must reject Irish self in order to belong; structural division of the novel; her cocoon like mentality in Enniscorthy
Para 2 – moral ambiguity of her decisions – everything she does seems to be motivated by wanting the best for others, but leads to pain – shows the impossibility to remaining master of two worlds; third person limited perspective
Para 3 –modernity vs Ireland
‘In both Ireland and Brooklyn, Eilis feels that her life is controlled by others.’ Discuss.
Toibin explores the complexity of taking agency in our lives, suggesting that a reluctance to disappoint others may constrain us from making decisions and asserting our adulthood. He further condemns individuals who engage in self-delusion towards the extent of their control over their lives and thus let their decisions be guided by others.
Para 1 – life is controlled by others because she is afraid to take agency and disappoint her mother
Para 2 – she deludes herself into thinking that she has control over her decisions
Para 3 – this leads her into a spiral of decisions that seem to be in her control but are eventually revealed as motivated by others – these cause pain
In Tóibín’s novel, the migration experience profoundly affects those who stay as well as those who leave.’
Toibin shows the migration experience to bring both loss and growth to the lives of those affected by it, ultimately suggesting that its most profound impact is a need to mature.
Para 1 – loss is present in Irish national consciousness, colours everyday interactions; the pain of no longer shaping someone’s life, letting go of children
Para 2 – loss of self for those who go, needing to gain a second identity; leads to a duality of self – however, core self remains
Para 3 – migration forces us to mature; sexual capital
‘By returning to Brooklyn and marriage to Tony, Eilis recognises the limitations to her independence.’ Do you agree?
Para 1 – decision still guided by others due to her inability to assert her agency/fear of conflict and reluctance to grow up
Para 2 – she is forever contained within the barriers of whatever society she finds herself in because of her sustained fear of conflict
Para 3 – she is afforded more adulthood/independence from the life shaped for her by her mother in Brooklyn – rejects letting her mother live vicariously through her
Home is a construct of the mind. How is this idea explored in the novel?
Toibin shows that a place of true belonging can be an unattainable ideal.
Para 1 – idealise what we can’t have – Irish migrants never truly feel at home
Para 2 – home shifts with relationship connections
Para 3 – sustained longing for home is a manifestation of our longing for childhood
Brooklyn places responsibility to self above responsibility to others
Brooklyn shows the negative consequences of placing duty to others above your responsibility to yourself, condemning those who do so. However, it simultaneously acknowledges that it is impossible for individuals to abandon their responsibilities to society without losing their belonging.
Para 1 – submitting to the wishes of others may simply be a way of keeping your responsibility to yourself
Para 2 – doing this leads to pain and conflict
Para 3 – maintaining some responsibility to others, even if it is a way of shielding yourself from the need to take agency, results in being able to function effectively in society
How does Toibin convey a sense of divided loyalty in Brooklyn?
Para 1 – our environment forms our identity; therefore, the migration experience results in a division of self and thus a division of loyalty – must reject Irish self in order to belong; structural division of the novel; her cocoon like mentality in Enniscorthy
Para 2 – moral ambiguity of her decisions – everything she does seems to be motivated by wanting the best for others, but leads to pain – shows the impossibility to remaining master of two worlds; third person limited perspective
Para 3 –modernity vs Ireland
‘In both Ireland and Brooklyn, Eilis feels that her life is controlled by others.’ Discuss.
Toibin explores the complexity of taking agency in our lives, suggesting that a reluctance to disappoint others may constrain us from making decisions and asserting our adulthood. He further condemns individuals who engage in self-delusion towards the extent of their control over their lives and thus let their decisions be guided by others.
Para 1 – life is controlled by others because she is afraid to take agency and disappoint her mother
Para 2 – she deludes herself into thinking that she has control over her decisions
Para 3 – this leads her into a spiral of decisions that seem to be in her control but are eventually revealed as motivated by others – these cause pain
In Tóibín’s novel, the migration experience profoundly affects those who stay as well as those who leave.’
Toibin shows the migration experience to bring both loss and growth to the lives of those affected by it, ultimately suggesting that its most profound impact is a need to mature.
Para 1 – loss is present in Irish national consciousness, colours everyday interactions; the pain of no longer shaping someone’s life, letting go of children
Para 2 – loss of self for those who go, needing to gain a second identity; leads to a duality of self – however, core self remains
Para 3 – migration forces us to mature; sexual capital
‘By returning to Brooklyn and marriage to Tony, Eilis recognises the limitations to her independence.’ Do you agree?
Para 1 – decision still guided by others due to her inability to assert her agency/fear of conflict and reluctance to grow up
Para 2 – she is forever contained within the barriers of whatever society she finds herself in because of her sustained fear of conflict
Para 3 – she is afforded more adulthood/independence from the life shaped for her by her mother in Brooklyn – rejects letting her mother live vicariously through her
Home is a construct of the mind. How is this idea explored in the novel?
Toibin shows that a place of true belonging can be an unattainable ideal.
Para 1 – idealise what we can’t have – Irish migrants never truly feel at home
Para 2 – home shifts with relationship connections
Para 3 – sustained longing for home is a manifestation of our longing for childhood
If you hadn’t married him, would you still be going back?
How does Eilis’ sense of duty shift throughout the novel?
Para 1 – sense of duty to Ireland must lessen as she loses her Irish identity/adapts
Para 2 – it is not duty that drives her final decision, but rather a fear of conflict
Para 3 – still retains her sense of duty to her mother, this is what fuels her fear of conflict/reluctance to make decisions
‘Eilis’ sense of self is formed more by others than herself.’ To what extent do you agree?
Toibin suggests that when individuals are reluctant to make decisions, their future and thus identity is shaped by the decisions of others. This reluctance is shown to spring from a longing for the unattainable ideal of a renewed childhood, which Toibin portrays as taking root in the desire to please others.
Para 1 – sense of self is malleable in order to adapt
Para 2 – decisions and sense of self shaped by others due to her being reluctant to make decisions, these decisions would force her to shape who she is
Para 3 – doesn’t want to shape who she is because that means adulthood, doesn’t want to hurt mother
How does the novel show the benefits of remaining passive?
‘Brooklyn’ suggests that while remaining passive can allow us to avoid confronting our fears in the short term, the eventual consequences of doing so are condemnable, bringing pain and suffering.
Para 1 – allows individuals to avoid confronting their fear of conflict
Para 2 – brings us comfort, makes us feel that we are sparing others from pain
Para 3 – however, long term it causes more suffering than the situation otherwise would have
The true subject of the novel is the nature of personal freedom
The novel suggests that absolute personal freedom is unattainable, and portrays this as a consequence of individuals’ inability to change to such an extent as to transcend their deepest fears.
Para 1 – different environments allow us different degrees of freedom
Para 2 – individuals bound by their fear are unable to be free
Para 3 – we cannot transcend our deepest fears – true subject
What role does silence play in ‘Brooklyn’?
Silence allows individuals to avoid that which they fear, but is ultimately shown to bring pain and suffering.
Para 1 – emotional repression of Lacey family allows them to avoid confronting loss
Para 2 – Eilis’ silence allows her to avoid confrontation (esp with mother)
Para 3 – when we are silent, our decisions are made by others
