Departures

by Jennifer C. Cornell

Overview

The stories in this extraordinary collection are set in Northern Ireland, specifically Belfast, the center for more than thirty years of fighting between Roman Catholic nationalists and Protestants loyal to the British crown. Cornell is not preoccupied, however, with the details of the war. Her stories explore the emotional and psychological consequences of the struggle to endure not only violence, but loss, failure, and the inability to believe.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780822978831
Publisher:	University of Pittsburgh Press
Publication date:	01/15/1995
Series:	Drue Heinz Literature Prize , #14
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	176
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Jennifer C. Cornell teaches at Oregon State University and her fiction has appeared in publications such as TriQuarterly and New England Review.

Table of Contents

Cover Half-title Title Copyright Dedication Contents Heat����������� The Start of the Season������������������������������ Hydrophobic������������������ Departures����������������� Stigmata��������������� Touched�������������� Outtake�������������� Inheritance������������������ Rise����������� The Swing of Things�������������������������� Punching In������������������ Undertow���������������

Editorial Reviews

"Departures", a collection of short stories set primarily in Belfast, won the 1994 Drue Heinz Literature Prize with good reason. The stories offer naturally maturing plots and characters as well as emotional and psychological responses to a life laden with war-zone ethics, unemployment, poverty, and the challenge of daily survival. Cornell never addresses the obvious details of Northern Ireland's war. Rather, she confronts the effects of those details (random bombings, persistent religious division, and incessant economic and emotional depression) on the lives of families, couples, and children. The strongest piece in the collection is "The House" because the description of the deteriorating house structure, a community center, becomes a pivotal symbol of a family's (and a people's) loss of hope and their acceptance of that loss. Cornell's narrators, usually daughters, speak as awakened children, realistic and without romantic ideals. They seem lost innocents, confused and frustrated by the future they will inherit: alcoholism, unemployment, depression, grief. Yet, beneath the disparity, they desperately hope to discover some truth, some strength that may save them.

Janet St. John

The stories offer naturally maturing plots and characters as well as emotional and psychological responses to a life laden with war-zone ethics, unemployment, poverty, and the challenge of daily survival. . . . Cornell's narrators, usually daughters, speak as awakened children, realistic and without romantic ideals. They seem lost innocents, confused and frustrated by the future they will inherit: alcoholism, unemployment, depression, grief. Yet beneath the disparity, they desperately hope to discover some truth, some strength that may save them.

Booklist

This beautifully written collection of stories tells how the beleaguered, ordinary folks living in Belfast manage to keep their faith alive and their souls together. . . A book full of tenderness and compassion.

Library Journal

Cornell's stories . . . are reminiscent of Flannery O'Connor's plots, but with a crucial difference. Cornell's stories end with a redemption of love, whether it be familial, religious, or marital. Cornell's characters are swept up in the tide of love, or at the very least, they experience a recognition of love as the grace which gives life its value.

Colorado Review

Cornell writes with a burnished melancholy and a soft wit, rolling out an undulating series of elegant images. . . . She writes model short stories: lucid, inventive and teeming with overlapped memories, like creamier versions of William Trevor's wry fables of unfulfillment.

New York Times Book Review

“Cornell writes with a burnished melancholy and a soft wit, rolling out an undulating series of elegant images. . . . She writes model short stories: lucid, inventive and teeming with overlapped memories, like creamier versions of William Trevor’s wry fables of unfulfillment.”

—New York Times Book Review

“This beautifully written collection of stories tells how the beleaguered, ordinary folks living in Belfast manage to keep their faith alive and their souls together. . . . A book full of tenderness and compassion; highly recommended.”

—Library Journal

“The stories offer naturally maturing plots and characters as well as emotional and psychological responses to a life laden with war-zone ethics, unemployment, poverty, and the challenge of daily survival. . . . Cornell’s narrators, usually daughters, speak as awakened children, realistic and without romantic ideals. They seem lost innocents, confused and frustrated by the future they will inherit: alcoholism, unemployment, depression, grief. Yet beneath the disparity, they desperately hope to discover some truth, some strength that may save them.”

—Booklist

“Cornell’s vignettes are strong, impassioned portraits of very different people and how they cope with their Irish heritage of violence: literary yet accessible pieces which go beyond the usual clichés.”

—Midwest Book Review

“Cornell’s stories . . . are reminiscent of Flannery O’Connor’s plots, but with a crucial difference. Cornell’s stories end with a redemption of love, whether it be familial, religious, or marital. Cornell’s characters are swept up in the tide of love, or at the very least, they experience a recognition of love as the grace which gives life its value.”

—Colorado Review

From the Publisher