Brooklyn Text Response

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Text response responding to the prompt:
Eilis’s personal transformation is shown to be ultimately futile at the end of the novel. Do you agree?
Some feedback would be great!

In Colm Toibin’s novel ‘Brooklyn’ the protagonist Eilis Lacey is portrayed as a vulnerable woman whom the reader witnesses adjusting and refashioning her attributes to acquiesce with life in Brooklyn. Eilis, once a dependant and reliant girl in Enniscorthy transforms into an individualistic and integral woman. Upon arriving in Brooklyn Eilis’s moral values contort to accustom to the diverse American culture, while creating a woman of resilience and maturity. While in America Eilis becomes exposed to a lot more and a true representation of the land of opportunity. Ambiguously, Ireland becomes a representation of divided and uncertain loyalties. The reader experiences Eilis’s dependence and necessity for Rose’s influence fade as she becomes a person who finds their identity and belongs in Brooklyn with her husband, Tony.

In Enniscorthy, Eilis Lacey was a susceptible girl, loyal to her values and her family. Her migration to Brooklyn sculpts her into a self-reliant woman who relationships with those she loves back home become severed and she establishes new relationships that are pivotal for her happiness in Brooklyn. Many readers may interpret her actions in Brooklyn as unethical and somewhat loose-moraled yet Toibin does not intend to portray a negative connotation, he simply wishes to identify the vast adjustments and personal changes Eilis has made since moving to Brooklyn. At the beginning of the novel, Eilis is very loyal to her mother and has a strong relationship. However, as she moves away she begins to lose her trust in her mother and ‘did not mention Tony in her letters’. This positions the reader to believe that Eilis’s links with her mother had been severed as she did not deem it important that her mother knew the details of her new life. However, in Eilis’s vague and diminishing relationship with her mother the reader is drawn to consider her brother Jack and his telling Eilis ‘don’t say a word to Mammy’ about his English girlfriend. This allows the reader to consider that an element of distrust must exist between Eilis’s mother and the children. As Tony becomes so fundamental to Eilis’s survival in Brooklyn he begins to forge a homely relationship that substitutes the once strong relation with her mother. Tony is the reason Eilis is complacent in Brooklyn and ‘makes her feel happy’. Their romance progresses and Tony begins envisioning a future with ‘kids who are Dodgers fans’ and a ‘house on Long Island’. As Eilis’s feelings intensify Tony becomes the most important part of her life and finally her husband. However, their marriage is simply Eilis fulfilling ‘the promise’ of returning to Tony after her visit to Enniscorthy. Upon returning to Enniscorthy Eilis becomes personally aware of the transformation that had taken place within herself. She had once viewed Jim Farrell as ‘rude’ and ‘stuck up’ with his ‘hair all greasy’ yet after her time in Brooklyn she admires his ‘manners’ and becomes involved in a romance with him. Toibin uses this to show the reader that the ‘old’ Eilis would’ve stayed true and loyal to the man she had committed herself to. Yet the reader witness’s doubts emerging about her marriage, and the thoughts the maybe she ‘shouldn’t have married him’. Jim suggests that him and Eilis ‘get engaged’ positioning the reader to believe that Eilis keeping her marriage a secret is a decision that she will come to regret. Despite, the capricious relationships that Eilis has throughout the novel she develops the maturity to know that returning to Brooklyn and to Tony is the right decision in order for her happiness and to prevent Tony’s heart breaking.

Enniscorthy is a small town with little opportunity for growth and it is only when Eilis migrates to Brooklyn and begins to accustom to a new way of life that she understands this and begins to truly understand America as the ‘land of opportunity’. In Enniscorthy Eilis is a dependant girl who relies strongly on her sister and mother to make fundamental life decisions for her. Eilis does not see it unusual that Rose has ‘so precisely organised her going’ because Rose takes the matriarchal role in the household and Eilis has no need to be independent. Eilis in Enniscorthy is considered a ‘wallflower’ and Toibin allows the reader to feel as if she is socially challenged and naïve to the ways of the rest of the world. However, as the reader witnesses her take the journey to America they can see the impact the ‘land of the free and the brave’ has on her character. Upon arriving in Brooklyn, Georgina ‘began putting make-up’ on Eilis and instructing her not to ‘look too innocent’. This allows the reader to understand that simply being in America began to change Eilis. When Eilis first arrives her heart remains in Enniscorthy while her body attempts to forge a path of identity and belonging in Brooklyn. Eilis’s journey to Brooklyn takes her to unexplored territory which in turn plagues her with homesickness and nostalgia. Despite the friendships she establishes with Patty and Diana, Eilis struggles to feel ‘solid’ in Brooklyn and is constantly thinking of her life in Enniscorthy. While at times Eilis feels obscured by the vast difference of Brooklyn and Enniscorthy it is also a place where she is able to renew herself and carve an independent future without the controls of her family shadowing her every move. As the reader experiences Eilis’s transformations they witness her making Brooklyn her home. Her brother Jack’s experiences are an indication of what Eilis is likely to feel and the reader establishes the fact that she may be reluctant to return home.  Whilst in Brooklyn Eilis becomes an individualistic women governed by integrity and the desire to become ‘grown up and serious’. After Rose’s death, Eilis returns to Enniscorthy, a place that has become a distant memory while Brooklyn is reality. Eilis returns poised, confident and self-assured as a sign that America has indeed left its mark. Nancy, Eilis’s friend from Ireland sees her as ‘changed and different in her American clothes’. Toibin uses this to appeal to the reader’s sense of familiarity because Eilis is now defined by her hometown as American.

Rose Lacey is Eilis’s role model and best friend in Enniscorthy yet when she moves to Brooklyn Rose becomes a memory and an aspiration. Towards the beginning of the novel Toibin depicts Eilis as incompetent with Rose’s influence and superior knowledge. Eilis becomes more independent and her necessity for Rose fades as she begins to do what ‘Rose would’ve done’. Initially, Eilis feels subjacent to Rose, her ‘glamour’ and ‘readiness for life’ but as she grows in herself she feels less and less need for Rose’s leadership and ‘makes it clear that she doesn’t need any of her sister’s clothes’. While Toibin shows the reader Eilis’s tangible love for Rose and her ‘hysterical sobbing’ when she dies, Rose is from Eilis’s previous life, she has a new life in Brooklyn that is reality and as much as Eilis struggles to accept it Enniscorthy is a memory of her childhood.  Toibin uses Rose’s death to symbolise great sorrow and loss while ultimately showing Eilis’s positive emergence from her sister’s shadow. Tony’s sympathetic support reassures Eilis of her love for him and her life other than what is happening back in Enniscorthy. Rose paved Eilis’s path to America, giving her the opportunity to become more than was possible in Ireland. Once Eilis was able to break away from Rose as a maternal figure she became independent and began to only look to Rose for love and no longer for the making of fundamental life situations.

Throughout the novel Eilis Lacey makes prodigious growth as a character and becomes more independent and individualistic as a result of the change in her surroundings and company. Eilis continues to transform until the end of the novel where she displays her progress in returning to her husband despite the potential hardships their relationship may suffer.