I thought of the women in Iran, rising up to protest their oppression, after the death in custody of Mahsa Amini, imprisoned by the morality police for a minor breach of religious rules about wearing the hijab.

When he did, and went to put it round her, she cowered. The only thing he thought to do was to take his coat off. When he shone it on what was there, he judged by what was on the floor, that the girl within had been there for longer than the night. He couldn’t properly see and was obliged to go back to the lorry, for the torch. As soon as he forced this bolt, he sensed something within but many a dog he’d found in a coal shed with no decent place to lie. When he let down the tail board and went to open the coal house door, the bolt was stiff with frost, and he had to ask himself if he had not turned into a man consigned to doorways, for did he not spend the best part of his life standing outside one or another, waiting for them to be opened. Making a delivery during the Christmas rush, Furlong hears voices singing the carol ‘Adeste Fideles’. To drive home the hypocrisy, Keegan makes subtle allusions to the spiritual signifiance of Christmas which is meant to be a time of hope. Content with his family life, he’s a coal merchant who becomes aware of appalling cruelty to girls sequestered at the local convent. Her central character Bill Furlong - whose unmarried mother was the recipient of unusual kindness and acceptance - has by 1985 made a good life for himself despite being illegitimate in conservative Ireland. Small Things Like These tackles a shameful period in Ireland’s internal history, its treatment of unmarried mothers, and Keegan’s powerful novella shows the importance of individuals stepping up and making a difference. Australia is currently embarking on coming to terms with its treatment of its First Nations with the implementation of the Uluru Statement from the Heart. Germany’s shameful period under the Nazis is an obvious example, but their postwar transformation is salutary. Some are more egregious than others, it is true, but what matters is how the history is acknowledged, how redress is managed, and how steps are taken to prevent any recurrence. Since Cathy’s review covers everything you need to know about the the Magdalene laundries which are the background to the novella, I’m going to focus on unpacking the title, and why I think the book won the Orwell Prize for Political Fiction.Īll countries have shameful periods in their history. The book was shortlisted for the 2022 Booker Prize and the 2022 Rathbones Folio Prize, and won the 2022 Orwell Prize for Political Fiction. A year after Cathy posted her enticing review of Claire Keegan’s novella Small Things Like These for Novellas in November 2021, I read it for Novellas in November 2022.

Claire keegan small things