NORMAL PEOLPLE by Sally Rooney

Investigation of the novel

• TITLE

  The title “normal people” provides the reader to ask himself what is normal, what makes people normal and, because of the title, who is the ideal reader of the novel?

  Everyone use the adjective “normal” to refer to something or someone that is common/ordinary but actually being normal is simply a quotation. It is something that people say because they heard it over and over again.

  Nowadays to be a normal person is a difficult thing and actually nobody can give a definition of normality.

• COVER

  The first impact is a strong red color symbol of courage, passion and strength. At the center of the cover there is an image. It represents two lovers in a tin half open and half closed, so the reader expects them to come out. In the tin the two characters live protected and isolated to the outside. Their condition is half-hidden from the eye: they want to meet the world outside and at the same time they need protection.

• FIRST PAGE

  The novel starts with a quotation. The use of quotations is a postmodern technique. In this case the writer quotes G. Eliot and so defines the key of lecture of his writing. The quotation expresses a postmodern thought that is connected to religious code and tells about the inner secret of relationships: “till some personality touches theirs with a peculiar influence, subduing them into receptiveness”. By making use of the quotation, the novelist draws the line guide of her novel based on relationships. Indeed, according to the quotation, people have a significant role in your mental balance. No revelation is meaningful like a particular person who has an influence on you.

• STRUCTURAL ANALYSIS

  The story told deals with four years. The chapters are divided according to the month and the year token in consideration and the story is full of flashbacks. This remains to the features of postmodern novel that is the simultaneous concept of time. According to modern and postmodern writers, time is not “before and after” but is made of past memories and future expectation that together live in human beings' mind.