Normal People: the TV version

 

Having watched all six hours or so of the TV series, I feel qualified to judge Normal People. Since Ms Rooney is credited as co-author of the TV version, I can assume she is responsible for the considerable amplification and clarification from the original book.

To save you, reader, the trouble of seeing all the episodes, I can summarise the plot straightaway: boy meets girl, and after a few tribulations, they live happily ever after. There are a few variations on that theme, but essentially, this is Jane Austen for the 21st century. Connell appears to be stand-offish, but after a few errors in etiquette (inviting the wrong girl to the School Prom) he gets it right in the end, by threatening fisticuffs at the evil man (Marianne’s brother).

Marianne, the heroine, suffers abuse at home, and so can only relate to males who dominate and hurt her. She falls for Connell, who despite being the most popular boy in the school, and then a wildly popular student at Trinity College Dublin, and despite being admired for his creative writing,  is incapable of revealing his feelings and becomes deeply depressed. There is not the slightest justification for this depression. I am told this can happen in real life, but in fiction, as a reader you expect a justification for the actions of the main characters, and I spent much of the series shouting at Connell to wake up out of his torpor and to save Marianne from her horrific family. Perhaps that the plot device – so we can all shout at the screen. Marianne is much more simple: once Mr Right comes along and stands up to her abusive brother, she is saved, and it seems she can abandon all the S/M she was engaged with earlier. 

Except, of course, that this is the 21st century and women are no longer saved; Connell wins a scholarship on a creative writing course in New York, and Marianne stays in Dublin. We feel, however, that the couple will remain in love and will be reunited, even if physically apart. After all, they spent six hours in each other’s company during the TV series.

 All that remains is to note the other fashionable references. Connell discovers his future by becoming a writer. In the book we hear nothing about his writing; in the TV show, Marianne says something about him revealing himself. Clearly this is confessional creative writing, although despite getting great praise for his writing, Connell still has to be rewarded by an educational body that grants him a scholarship for him to feel validated. This is not creative writing to make money, it should be clear; this is revealing your innermost thoughts, the kind of thing we stop doing after we are fourteen.