August 2019: Milkman (Burns)

Post date: Sep 14, 2019 11:1:51 PM

Anna Burn’s Man Booker Prize winning novel Milkman was

an exploration of cultural and political divisions. In particular, it was

a harrowing account of one young woman’s life in Belfast during the

turbulent and violent sectarian struggles of the 1970’s. The book has

received mixed reviews in the press, and our members also had quite divided

reactions. It is written in a challenging, stream of consciousness style

that involves long, clause-rich sentences and paragraphs that can stretch on

for pages. The action jumps back and forth in time, which mirrors the way

memory works when recalling traumatic events, but which also can make it

hard to follow the central events of the story.

In the end, however, the plot is relatively straight forward. The novel’s

narrator, who we only ever know as “middle sister,” is eighteen and living

in Belfast (though the city is never named) with her mother and three “wee

sisters.” She tries her best to ignore the political tensions which

surround her and which have taken the lives of two of her brothers and have

caused two other siblings to flee the country. She prefers to escape to the

pages of novels set in the 18th and 19th centuries, reading them as she

walks home from work or class or from visiting her “maybe-boyfriend,” who

lives in a different part of town.

This habit of walking while lost in a book seems strange and crazy to her

family, friends and community. Doesn’t she know the streets are a de facto

war zone? Is she oblivious? Arrogant? Insane? This odd behavior draws

the attention of one of the most powerful local para-militaries: the 41

year old “Milkman,” a shadowy, menacing figure, who despite his nickname,

has never delivered anyone’s milk. Pretending to be concerned for her

safety, he begins to stalk the narrator, offering her rides home (which she

refuses) and eventually threatening to kill her maybe-boyfriend if she

continues to refuse his advances.

The novel’s meandering and densely descriptive style provides an effective

and emotive method for conveying the psychological consequences of the

narrator’s increasing trauma and desperation as she tries to resist the

Milkman and to navigate the difficult social landscape of her community in

crisis. The narrator’s disjointed, and yet deeply revealing, inner

monologue highlights the long term effects of living in a city that is torn

in two by a vicious conflict, one which demands fierce tribal loyalties and

which requires strict social controls to maintain loyalty and to care for

those caught up in the violence. It is almost a master class on the costs

of such divisions, and on the terrible things that humans do in such

circumstance and the resources that they have to survive and, on occasion,

to resist.

Perhaps, one of the clearest examples of this cost is represented by the

novel’s almost complete lack of proper names for people and for places. It

is a society where names are vitally important, so much so that each

community has individuals who supervise the naming of all children to make

sure that no baby is given a moniker that more properly belongs to the

culture of the “other side.” However, it is also a place where secrecy is

absolutely essential, a place where anyone could be a paramilitary operative

or, worse, an informer. Therefore, all the characters are known simply in

terms of their connection to the narrator (e.g. third brother-in-law), their

distinguishing characteristic (e.g. Chef, the guy who liked to cook), or

their role in the community (e.g. real milkman, who actually delivered the

milk). This stylistic device is thus appropriate to the book’s setting.

However, some reader’s may find it distracting and difficult. (In the end,

I found it surprisingly helpful. It meant I never had one of those moments

where I was wondering “Bill? Now, who was Bill again, was he the cousin…”)

Given these sorts of considerations, the novel’s distinctive style has

received much praise for being uniquely appropriate to its subject matter.

However, it is clearly not to everyone’s tastes, and even those of us who

loved the novel confessed to finding it difficult to get into at first.

Some never warmed to the book, and found a slog until the very end.

Perhaps we can then sympathize with the New York Times reviewer who said

that he “found Milkman to be interminable,” and that he “would not recommend

it to anyone [he] liked.” Judging by our discussion of the novel, I suspect

our members would find this condemnation too harsh. Instead, we might

suggest reading a chapter or two and then quitting, guilt free, if you just

don’t warm to it.

I would agree to this recommendation, with one caveat. The novel focuses

on the narrator’s internal monologue, however, Burns has a remarkable talent

for dialogue, and through this dialogue she introduces us to some amazingly

complex and memorable characters. The book is also incredibly funny and

poignant in parts, and in sharing a few of these passages during our

discussion, some of group discovered that they enjoyed the book and liked

its inhabitants far more than they realized. In fact, someone suggested

the book might be like one of those movies or outings with friends that you

don’t think much of at the time, but that you come to treasure in hindsight

through remembering and retelling. Therefore, I would add that there might

be benefits to keeping up with the book and pressing on through all the

narrator’s seemingly endless musings and frustrating moments of inaction.

In the end, as the narrator’s own psychological journey reveals, some things

cannot be adequately processed in the moment, some things only become clear

after a process of reflection.