I promised in my post on Claire Keegan’s novella Small things like these, that a review of Antarctica would be coming soon, and I like to keep my promises, so here it is.

First, though, I must say I’m thrilled to have had this unexpected opportunity to spend time with Keegan whose So late in the day (my review) I loved when I read it in 2023. Having now also read Small things like these and Antarctica, and having seen The quiet girl, the film adaptation of her story Foster, I have some overall thoughts about her writing. These are that, essentially, Keegan writes stories about ordinary humans living lives that we understand, not necessarily from our own experience, but certainly from our knowledge of the world. This makes them relatable. And the way she writes, the way she observes and describes rather than explains and judges, make her stories perfect for discussion.

Take “Antarctica” for example. It opens the collection and is a confronting story about a “happily married woman” who decides she’d like to experience sex with a different man. Although only a couple of us had read the story, it’s easy to summarise and it generated a good discussion. It invites questions like why would a “happily married woman” have such a wish, and then why, given this decision, did she take the risks she did in the way she did? After briefly discussing our various reactions to her decision, we talked about how easy it was to judge her – why did she go to his place, why did she follow him through the woods, why did she drink so much, and so on – and how little attention, by comparison, we gave to the man. (Is this because his behaviour in a still misogynistic world didn’t surprise us?) It’s a story about a woman taking her needs and desires, or maybe just a curiosity, into her own hands. The setup invites judgement from the first paragraph – on moral or practical grounds or both – but then makes you think. Why are you judging, who are you judging, not to mention what are you judging and why. What is most interesting, and most impressive, is that, despite how the story plays out, it does not feel like Keegan herself is judging. Rather, it feels like she is presenting a human being to us, and saying, what do you make of this?

“nothing will ever be the same”

It is this sense – this idea of telling stories about humans without judgement – that underpins Keegan’s writing for me. The stories in Antarctica are mostly set in Ireland or the USA, with a couple set in England, but setting feels less important than the fact that the stories are about humans. The specific place certainly adds a layer, such as in the Southern US-set “A scent of winter” where racism provides the background, but ultimately, the stories are human, not political, not particularly national even. The most important thing about place is the evocative ways Keegan uses it to create tone or to build tension. Most of the stories are set in small rural settings, often farms, or places that feel isolated in some other way, which focuses attention on the ways in which her characters, humans, are vulnerable. “Antarctica”, for example, is set in London but the action mostly takes place in confined settings – a bar, or a room. The city in fact provides an anonymity which increases our awareness of the woman’s isolation when it all comes to a head.

Many of the stories feature women – wives, sisters, young girls, adulterous lovers – but there are also male and child protagonists. The stories are not particularly feminist. They are not not-feminist either, because patriarchal values do pervade many of the stories. Essentially, though, the stories are about women as humans, coping within the society they find themselves in. There are women who are put upon by others (a sister in “Sisters”, a husband in “Men and women”); women who seek some happiness for themselves (as in “Love in the tall grass” and “Ride if you dare”); and mothers who are grieving (as in “Passport soup”, told through the eyes of the father). Then, there’s the young woman in “The Ginger Rogers sermon” who seduces a farmworker with shocking (though not what you are assuming) consequences.

The stories are serious, and sometimes bleak, but there is warmth and nurturing too. In “The singing cashier” a sister does what she can to care for and protect her younger sister, only to discover there can be dangers you don’t even consider. In “Burning palms”, despite a tragedy, the love between a grandmother and her grandson is palpable. People realise their limitations but live to tell the tale, like the narrator in “You can’t be too careful” who goes out in a boat with a violent murderer.

It’s hard to pick favourites, but of course I do have some. The titular story, “Antarctica”, is a shocker and one I won’t forget quickly. The next story, “Love in the tall grass”, is gentler but, in Claire Keegan style, somewhat like “So late in the day”, it is told drip-by-drip until finally you understand what is going on. It starts with a woman preparing for something – “when this day is over, nothing will ever be the same” – but we are not told what it is. There are unsettling words in the opening paragraph, like “the trembling hedge” and “this water is colder than a broken dream”. In paragraph two, there are “withered leaves” but also,

The clock on the mantle ticks happily. Not long now it seems to say. Not long now.

In this story, as in all, the detail is crucial. By the end, we know what the day is about, but what the end result will be, well, who knows? It’s a beautiful, precisely unfolded story about love, and the costs of hope. In “Men and women” and “Sisters”, a wife and a sister take a stand, if not exactly to take revenge, certainly to say, I am here and you can’t keep walking over me. Of course there were stories I liked less, or that worked less well for me, but every story offered something about humanity worth thinking about.

By the end of each story, “nothing will ever be the same”, but we don’t always know in what way. Keegan has the ability to tell an arresting story in language that is controlled but not cold, and through plotting that builds tension which is less about suspense than about unfolding a situation, a choice, a conundrum. How could I have been so late to this party?

Claire Keegan
Antarctica
London: Faber & Faber, 2023 (Orig. ed. 1999)
209pp.
ISBN: 9780571382217