A Review on: An Irish Rose

A Review on: An Irish Rose

The Dark Side of Life

“Too long a sacrifice can make a stone of the heart”

W.B.Yeats (1865-1939)

The author A.J.Cronin is a doctor by training but a writer as

profession. Cronin’s strengths were his narrative skill and powers of

acute observation and graphic description. He could see the dark side

of life in a better frame.

The plot of the story is arranged in a rousing style, the exposition of

‘An Irish Rose’ is highly detailed and gives a clear idea of the scenes,

and his graphic description as mentioned above also add to it. The

rising action of the story contains many momentarily good events

which make the climax much more effective. In the climax he is

resolving into the sacrifice, love, or affection etc of a sister.

The climax occurs after the entire crisis ended, the situation seems

good before the climax and it gets tragic in the next paragraph where

it has a beautiful ending.

The main characters in the story Rose Donegan a very young lady about

fourteen had many responsibilities regarding her brothers and her

father who spends most of his time in a nearby bar. She sees life much

seriously with love and affection towards her brothers and her father

and always has a pleasant smile and attitude. One of the most

important perspectives about her character is her pleasant attitude

towards anything and anyone and of course her deep affection, which

results in sacrificing her life.

Here Rose Donegan has to earn for the family, buy milk for her

youngest brother Michel. She had to cook, attend to the children and

father. With a slum child’s elemental knowledge she had to do

everything, even she would bargain the baker to extend her credit for

an extra loaf.

Rose has a shaggy dressing which shows the deprived condition of the

family; even she had to pawn the new dress that Cronin had paid for

her.

The other characters in the story include the Carroll’s, a middle aged

couple, childless and prosperous. Also include the youngest brother of

Rose; Michel, who is nine months old. Other than Michel there are

three more children who are younger than Rose, Donegan her father

and the writer himself. The minor characters were meaningful making

the rising action good.

Reading such a story could take us to such families where the children

(elder) had to deal with all responsibilities. Responsibilities are

rejected by the responsible. And future becomes unpredictable.