Customer Reviews

Year of the French

5 star:		(14)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

Anyone has a right to be suspicious of claims that appear extravagant, but, upon reflection, I genuinely believe this is the finest historical novel written in English, at least in the twentieth century (I suppose we should count "Vanity Fair" and "A Tale of Two Cities" as historicals, but none of poor, old Walter Scott's works compete). Its foreign language competition is limited to a handful of books, From "War and Peace," "The Leopard," and "The Forty Days of Musa Dagh," to "Am Himmel wie auf Erden," "Vor dem Sturm," and "I Promessi Sposi." Thomas Flanagan is simply a brilliant writer--lucid, thoroughly-engaging, controlled and masterful. His prose is flawless. Except for "The Leopard," I know of no historical novel that so richly and convincingly captures the ambience of a bygone world. The weather and the feel of chilled mud, the prejudice of blood, the nuances of the social order and the confusion of military operations, the errors and casual oversights that shape lives, and the interplay of great events and individual tragedies are all so perfectly interwoven and gracefully presented that the reader forgets this is only a novel and enters another reality. Of course, all this will sound like hyperbole to those who have not yet read this book--but once you have read it, you will find it haunts you for a long time. I've given several copies to cherished friends, as I also have done with Penelope Fitzgerald's "The Blue Flower" (which might have been a competitor for "best historical," were it not such a transcendent book that it won't be characterized by any genre). This is a wonderful book--please read it and help keep it in print.

The first book in Flanagan's panaromic sweep of Irish history. (see "Tenants of Time" & "The End of the Hunt")

Well written with characters the reader cares about set against the historical back drop of Wolfe Tone's failed 1789 rebellion against the English.

Compelling, a must read! Once you've read one of Flanagan's books you find yourself wishing he had written more, or started writing earlier.

This is writing at its finest, making the drama of history come alive through characters we relate to and care about. I was swept along from the first paragraph, held captive by beautiful language and vivid detail. As has been said of the Irish, "There's no cause like a lost cause". Writing like this makes one of history's saddest stories live on in the hearts of anyone lucky enough to come across it. I can't recommend this book highly enough.

I was compelled to write this review mostly because of the previous commentary. A lullaby? Hardly. Vivid and stirring, and not at all a textbook tome. As for the supposedly "homogenized" characterizations, I disagree completely. Owen McCarthy, as befitting of a poet, is a poetical character. His reflections on his people and his land are some of the most moving I have read in any novel in ages. The book brings to life not only events -- ugly battles between cannons and pikemen, in all their gore and horror -- but also the tenor of the times, the motivations of all sides in this epic confrontation. And while Flanagan does tend to belabor some of his points and themes in the latter third (which a keener editing eye should have taken care of; this was a debut novel), a reader emerges feeling that every side in this fight had good and bad sides, high motives and base motives. And, having seen firsthand the way that modern wars of revolt and insurrection quickly turn into butchery on all sides, Flanagan's illustration of the conduct and motivations of the warring parties in 1798 Ireland seems as dead-on an explanation of such events as you'll find anywhere.
A superb read, astonishing in its breadth and depth and its lyrical skill.

It is great to see this book available in a new edition. Flanagan was an academic who retired to complete three wonderful novels about the Irish struggle for independence. I read this book when it first came out, then anxiously watched for further releases by the author. I loved the other two volumes, as well, and was very sad when I read of his death. Perhaps, having written Ireland through to her independence, he didn't need to say anymore. And the three novels he wrote are surely sufficient to keep him alive to readers for generations to come.

This novel is centered on the Irish revolt of 1798 to which the French, ever wishing to harass the British, provided support. As in the best of such works it follows a web of characters who provide the author opportunities to relate all of the action across the island, yet who at the same time interrelate sufficiently to generate a plot as well as sympathy for "cast". The story is too intricate for a short review, but if you enjoy this sort of historical fiction this is one of the best examples you will find.

G.K. Chesterton once wrote, "For the great Gaels of Ireland/Are the men that God made mad,/For all their wars are merry/And all their songs are sad." This book captures that spirit admirably. The author has a sure grasp of historical fact, both of political events and of the texture of daily life (the smell of seaweed, the color of whisky). And he writes beautifully, with an ear for dialogue and an eye for the telling detail. But the real power of the book lies in the characters he creates, vividly realized and memorable (and this is true of both major and minor characters); the reader grows to care about them and feels genuine sorrow at their misfortunes. In the process, too, one learns a surprising amount of history. By the end of the book, I felt I understood the complex relationship between the British and the Irish far better than ever before -- and I'm part Irish, from a County Mayo family, and thought I knew it all already. I highly recommend this book.

Fiction expertly wrought can capture the myriad dimensions of war with greater efficiency than a history and can impart in great nuance the varieties of human drama and motivation, cutting quickly to why and how men fight. Some historians and journalists, like John Keegan or Cornelius Ryan, get inside this frame to write wholly satisfying accounts of battle, but in my view, nothing succeeds quite like Thomas Flanagan in his astonishing debut as a novelist. Next month in fact marks the 200 anniversary of that fateful year, which Flanagan has salvaged from history's footnotes to render as a perfect work of historical fiction. In his hands, Humbert's "invasion" of Ireland, the United Irish army, its men, their stories, and their destiny at the hands of Cornwallis--yes, that Cornwallis, beautifully brought to life--and Lake make the most compelling reading.

I loved the Thomas Flanagan trilogy.
By chance, I believe I came across the primary source books for each of the three.
The Year of the French seems quite obviously informed and inspired by Thomas Pakenham's Year of Liberty, a novelistic but dense nonfiction recounting of the western uprising in 1798.
The End of the Hunt takes much of its feel from "The Big Fellow", Frank O'Connor's beautiful account of Michael Collins' revolutionary career.
If these two are obvious the third is less so:
The Tenants of Time builds very effectively upon the foundations of Micheal Davitt's book, "The Fall of Feudalism in Ireland." This book, by an 1867 Fenian who became a leader of the Land League movement and an obstructionist member of the British parliament, is rich in detail about the Land League and the parliamentary struggle of the late 1800's that shows up in the Flanagan book.
I recommend these books to readers who have finished the trilogy, just as I would recommend the trilogy to all.

Likewise, I feel that I should try to reset the balance after Poetic Lullaby.
Since Flanagan tells the story through the journals of various protagonists it follows, surely, that some are going to be excessively florid and elaborate. The ministers and the gentry of the age were educated in this Latinate style of entry. Flanagan's approach is calculated to give the reader an ever-changing view of the events.
One problem that still exists when reading novels or watching films about events in Irish history is that they often come ready-charged with the receiver's own emotional-historical baggage. I can, I hope, watch Kirk Douglas in "The Vikings" with a greater element of detachment than I can view Liam Neesam as "Michael Collins". I dare say that a film about yet more recent Irish history would provoke an even more enthusiastic bout of head-nodding or impassioned disagreement. Flanagan is clearly aware of this. The device of giving over the narrative to such a wide spectrum of political and military interest serves to show us just how UN-black-and-white uprisings usually are.
I doubt that anyone who finishes this novel would ever say, "Well, that taught me nothing that I didn't know already". I fancied I knew a lot about "1798" and the Wild West of Ireland in particular. Well. Thanks, Mr Flanagan. Now I do.
Four stars. Why not five? Yeah, why not? Make that five.

I am not prone to hyperbole so I will use another's words -- a reviewer who said it best - this is the finest work of historical fiction written in the 20th century, perhaps the best since Dickens. Given the relative anonymity of the author and obscurity of the book, it is an astonishing work, that, while long, is readable even in the age of Twitter and 80,000, rather than 200,000 word novels. The author's use of multiple voices, not just to represent the interests and passions of the different groups of players in that critical year in Irish history, keeps the story moving as much as character development and plot lines, so do not be daunted by a novel written pre-Twitter. I have a passion for Irish history and have read the book several times -- my great aunt, Annie Moore, was the first person every processed through Ellis Island -- and this is the real deal for authenticity, =not just of plot but character and language. . People interested in great reading; people interested in great fiction;people interested in Irish history; people interested in historical fiction; people searching for what the English call a "great ripping yarn" must read this book.