Exploring The 'Rooneyverse': What Makes Writer Sally Rooney Such A Sensation?
Nobody could have marked the trajectory of Sally Rooney's exponential fame in the last few years, least of all the author herself. Today, mostly everyone on the internet--readers or otherwise--have heard of or are familiar with the thirty-three-year-old author, not simple owing to the hugely popular omnipresence of her novels, but also because both her big novels were adapted into television series that were smashing hits and featured A-list celebrities. Those who weren't moved by or impacted by her written works were soon impacted by the rendition of these stories on screen.
Rooney wrote her first novel Conversation with Friends in May of 2017. The book was a loose, flowing narration of the sweet and sour interactions between two young-adult friends as well as touching on other pressingly aching aspects of growing up including nurturing attraction for an older man and battling with one's own burgeoning body and the complications it brings about. Quickly after that followed the publication of Normal People in August of 2018, another stellar success for the ambiguous bitter-sweet story of space and emptiness and intimacy that Rooney wove between the two protagonists whose lives were intricately--and in some ways, inescapably--linked with each; Connell and Marianne.
Rooney's writing isn't particularly effusive--in fact, one of the most important features of her writing style is that she doesn't dwell too much on the internal minds and feelings of the characters. The dialogues do most of the work. But readers wholeheartedly absorbed and accepted it as the novel of the twenty-first generation; capturing love and lust in the millennial era, with all its fractured silences and infrequent connections. Her novels are also regarded as social, capturing acutely the cultural and existential milieu of Ireland today.
But after the hullaballoo of those two novels exploding with some (read: a lot) of help from the internet and the lukewarm reception to her next novel Beautiful World, Where are You? comes the much anticipated release in the month of September, 2024--this month(!) Today marks a huge day for Booktok; it is the day of the release of Rooney's highly-awaited fifth novel; Intermezzo.
Described by publishers as "an exquisitely moving story about grief, love, and family," Intermezzo has succeeded in making waves of waiting long before its actual release, in February of this year. A few select personalized and serialized Advanced Release Copies (ARCs) being pushed to the hands of the whos-who of the internet and book society. The buzz created has managed to sustain itself to a healthy and curious level on the readers online until the big release today.
Published by Faber and Faber, Intermezzo inspects the lives of brothers Peter and Ivan and the complex family dynamics that play out upon the death of their father. Apart from its cover image(s) employing vibrant shades of bright yellows and blues, the other striking aspect of this story is that, contrary to Rooney's other works, Intermezzo has two young men as its protagonists.
While the internet has gladly adopted Rooney as the writer of the zeitgeist, her works at once social and poignant as well as polarising and controversial, it is rather ironic that Rooney herself is not a keen fan of social media fame. The writer has no personal presence on social media and tends to stay fairly away from the limelight. While she is, without a doubt, taken by the staggering response to her work around the world, Rooney has always remained fiercely protective of her privacy and personal life.
Rooney's reticence perhaps play into the social nature of her work--most of her characters are caught in the tussle of words and the big rifts that are left in between. Her characters are marked by the general sense of detachment and alienation that even love can take on in this generation. While many have voiced out their dislike for her characters that seem to continue to make self-destructive choices, many others see themselves in Connell and Frances and Bobbi as it states as though in water, without hesitation, what they've been afraid of essentializing through their own lives.
Are you among those who'd rush to get their hands on a copy of Intermezzo, or are you going to sit this one out?
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