Second Novel in Doyle Trilogy, Disappointing and Unconvincing
OH, PLAY THAT THING
By Roddy Doyle
Random House
ISBN 0-676-97687-5
Reviewed by Sharon Greer
In the fall of 1999 Roddy Doyle was a guest of the Vancouver International Writers Festival. He had just published the brilliant novel, A Star Called Henry, the first part of The Last Roundup trilogy which was well received by both critics and the public.
This book told the story of Henry Smart who lived a harsh existence in the slums of Dublin. Growing up under adverse conditions, he becomes a soldier in the Irish Citizen Army and is among the rebels participating in the uprising on Easter Monday 1916.
A charming novel brimming with comic and poignant moments, A Star Called Henry left me
wanting more and eagerly anticipating the second part in the series. Five years passed before the sequel, Oh, Play That Thing finally arrived on the literary scene.
Oh, Play That Thing is a continuation of Henry Smart’s journey, but this time it is in the United States, leaving Ireland well behind him. Venturing through the hard streets of New York and the jazz clubs of Chicago, Doyle never seems really comfortable setting his story in the New World. It seems that his writing becomes awkward and less confident than when his stories are set in Ireland.
After the disillusioned Henry goes on the run from his former brothers-in-arms, he abandons his wife and daughter, and begins a new life in America. Doyle incorporates Louis Armstrong into a considerable but not entirely convincing part of the narrative.
Henry is employed as Louis’ “white man,” enabling Armstrong to enter the segregated jazz clubs of 1920s Chicago. Unfortunately, the story simply doesn’t work.
The frenetic pace of his current novel, albeit very successfully implemented in A Star Called Henry, doesn’t work here. In his previous story, you were swept along by the giddy energy of the writing and believed in it.
In this instance, it often seems implausible that Henry is able to cheat death so many times at the last moment. Or, that he ends up finding his wife working as a maid in a house he is robbing in Chicago, six years after he left her in a Dublin jail. And after awhile, you just get tired of Henry’s irresponsible ways.
I’m not easily offended by the rough language often used in Doyle’s works. It’s a peculiar feature of Irish culture, you’re not long in Dublin before you hear someone cursing. But Doyle’s use of the word “f**k” and other four letter words, reached new heights in this most recent novel.
I counted 16 “f**k” words in one very long paragraph. After such repetition, this degree of swearing becomes tedious with little or no impact whatsoever. It just gets really monotonous and irritating. One begins to wonder if word count was at the forefront of Doyle’s thinking.
Overall, I was disappointed with the novel (just in case you couldn’t tell by now), but I don’t give up that easily. I’m still keeping my fingers crossed that the third and final episode of this trilogy will convince me that Doyle hasn’t yet lost his touch in telling a wonderful tale.
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