Love and Summer by William Trevor

I want to talk to you about an author who is new to me, though he may not be to you or to most avid readers. His name is William Trevor, and I want to talk about his 2009 novel Love and Summer. Trevor’s novel The Story of Lucy Gault was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 2002; I intend to read that novel soon.

Everything about this little novel is understated. It is set in a small Irish town and the surrounding countryside, and is about as simple a story as one could imagine. It is as if the writer never raises his voice, never indulges in pathos, simply tells the story of a young orphan girl, Ellie, raised by nuns and, as was common practice, sent out as a servant to a small farm after a tragic accident left the owner of the farm both widowed and childless. Eventually, as the girl settles into the routines of the farm, Dillahan, the farmer whom she serves, asks her to marry him, and she does. “It was kindness—so it had seemed to her, and still did—when she had been offered marriage; it would have been unkind on her part if she’d said no.”

Quite by accident, Ellie runs into a stranger to the small town, a photographer, Florian Kilderry, who is himself an orphan, though his artist parents died when he was already grown. For a married woman even to be seen in the presence of an unmarried man, and a stranger no less, is quite out of the ordinary. But Ellie cannot help the rush of infatuation she feels for this man so much closer to her age than the older farmer whom she has married. Florian is in the process of selling the house and land he has inherited from his parents (and cannot really afford to maintain), and intends then simply to leave Ireland and strike out on his own.

And thus begins a summer of love for the two young people, a love as simple and innocent as can be imagined. What Ellie does not know, cannot know, is that she is a kind of stand-in for a girl Florian knew in his youth, Isabella.

The reader is also introduced to other characters in the small town, one of who is the daughter of a relatively wealthy family, known in the town simply as Miss Connulty. Miss Connulty also fell in love as a young woman, but the relationship ended in a pregnancy and secret abortion, at which time her Catholic mother spiritually and emotionally ostracized her daughter and distanced herself from the husband who aided the girl in obtaining an abortion. It is no wonder that Miss Connulty takes great interest in Ellie and what she sees as the perilous circumstances she is falling into.

Williams is exceptionally gifted in his ability to draw believable characters with whom the reader identifies and to describe what are really tragic events in their lives but with calm and apparently emotionless prose. He also creates an aura of suspense, of foreboding, such that the reader is on tenterhooks, hoping for the best but expecting the worst. And still, despite the mystery and the tension, the writing is so low key, so quiet.

At first Ellie is shocked that she has allowed herself to be seen talking to this strange man, ashamed at what the nuns who raised her would think of such conduct. But soon, though she realizes that others might see her, might jump to conclusions, she puts such concerns aside.  “Anyone could have seen them and she hadn’t cared.” For a time, she decides that should she run into him again, she will simply cross the street to avoid him, will not allow such foolishness to cause distress to her husband or bring shame on her. But when their paths cross again and Florian suggests that she does not remember him, all thoughts of avoidance are instantly dashed.

She felt the colour mounting in her face, as it had before. Her thoughts became disordered, as they had become then too, perverse and separated from her, as if they were not hers. She wanted to say that of course she remembered him. She wanted to say that she wondered about him, that she had tried not to, that she had known she should not. She wanted to say she had known immediately who it was when he’d said hullo.

Compared to the flame of most modern day romance novels, this little book is so tame, its characters on the whole so decent and considerate of others. There are no real villains, no heroes either, simply people trying to make the best of their lives. And yet Trevor is incredibly astute and meticulous in describing the inner lives of his characters, and so aware of the enormous changes in Ellie’s emotional life after she meets Florian, changes in her attitudes towards the more or less arranged marriage she is in , and towards the future she can anticipate.

Of course, I will not give way the ending of the book, nor will I tell you much more of the story. In the end it is the emotional intelligence of the writer that is most important, the actual course of events much less so. Suffice it to say that it is a beautiful little story of loneliness and isolation, but also of hope and loyalty. My suspicion is that once you have read this book of Trevor’s, you will want to read lots more. I know that I do.