The Temporary Gentleman

The Temporary Gentleman by Sebastian Barry

Oh, Mr Barry, you can do no wrong!

I have read most of Barry's novels as the story of the Dunnes and the McNultys unfolds.  He singles out various members of  the family and documents chapters in their lives, the series being a patchwork of narratives about the lives of the various family members.  After reading Days Without End I checked the Wiki entry on Barry and found that there were two titles that I had not read, and The Temporary Gentleman is one such.

As usual you can count on getting a good review from the Guardian:

https://www.theguardian.com/books/2014/mar/29/temporary-gentleman-review-sebastian-barry-novel

Here is a review from an Amazon customer, modified where my opinion differed and which wasn't by very much, which nevertheless pretty much sums up how I felt about the book:

Sebastian Barry, as often he does, brings a lyrical sadness to this tale. I was knocked out by the opening sequence, it had something of the impact that the opening chapter of Enduring Love had.  The events described in that chapter constitute a forerunner to a number of nearly fatal disasters that befall Jack McNulty. But the main theme, the slow deterioration of a marriage and Jack's inability to face the degree to which he is destroying Mai, in spite of his constant protestations of love, is written in Barry's entirely engaging style. It is the voice of the story teller, the weaver of yarns. I love that style when his text flows over the page in one paragraph, seemingly seamlessly; if there is punctuation you do not notice it, and his powers of description, the words he finds are so far beyond the commonplace.  I picked up this book after I dropped my current read in the bath, just long enough to require a dry on the Aga and an iron, so not wishing to be without a bedtime comforter I chose that close to hand.  I read The Temporary Gentleman through two or three days, wanting to turn the pages....... and not really wanting to resume afterwards Knowledge of Angels which, being a 'set book', must be finished.   There are a number of sub-themes running through Barry's novel. One of these is the nature and impact of colonialism on both the colonised, and the coloniser. All of that is handled very well. The reader also meets Roseanne whose story will be told in Secret Scripture. Barry is a first class craftsman, ans this work confirms once more that he is a writer of real seriousness, but with that a master of story making.

To recap, here is a list of Barry's series:

The Whereabouts of Eneas McNulty (1998)

Annie Dunne (2002)

A Long Long Way (2005)

The Secret Scripture (2008)

On Canaan's Side (2011)

The Temporary Gentleman (2014)

Days Without End (2016)