Normal People

by Sally Rooney

Lately he’s consumed by a sense that he is in fact two separate people, and soon he will have to choose which person to be on a full-time basis, and leave the other person behind.

memory she will find this moment unbearably intense, and she’s aware of this now, while it’s happening.

It suggests to Connell that the same imagination he uses as a reader is necessary to understand real people also, and to be intimate with them.

He got up from the sofa. I can only tell you what happened, he said. Well, maybe you’re misinterpreting what happened. But Connell had already left the room.

I know I’m being dramatic, Connell said. It’s not like she did anything that bad. But I feel fucked up about it. Marianne heard herself in a voice like hard ice saying: I would like to slit her throat.

alone with him like this. It makes her life seem very manageable suddenly.

Looking in his eyes she says: Well, hello. He senses a certain receptivity in her expression, like she’s gathering information about his feelings, something they have learned to do to each other over a long time, like speaking a private language. He can feel his face get warm as she looks at him but he doesn’t want to look away. He can gather information from her face too. He gathers that she has things she wants to tell him.

he was never damaged like she was. She just made him feel that way.

just as their relationship in school had been on his terms, their relationship now was on hers. But she’s more generous, he thought. She’s a better person.

There’s always been something inside her that men have wanted to dominate, and their desire for domination can look so much like attraction, even love.

His appearance is like a favorite piece of music to her, sounding a little different each time she hears it.

I guess we misunderstood each other.

So why, despite its factual accuracy, does this feel like a dishonest way of narrating what happened? What is the missing element, the excluded part of the story that explains what upset them both?

People have forgotten about her. She’s a normal person now.

No one can be independent of other people completely, so why not give up the attempt, she thought, go running in the other direction, depend on people for everything, allow them to depend on you, why not.