9/10
Sally Rooney’s prose and complex characters are universally acclaimed, but her novels are still divisive. Whether or not a reader enjoys Rooney’s work is largely dependent on how much they can stand insufferable characters, messy relationships, and dialogue without quotation marks.
Considering she’s had massive release parties, sold millions of copies, and collaborated with Baggu, it seems a lot of people stand them just fine. Much of this popularity comes from her 2018 novel Normal People, which has since been adapted into a limited series starring Paul Mescal and Daisy Edgar-Jones.
Intermezzo, Rooney’s most recent novel, is set in modern-day Ireland and alternates between the perspectives of two brothers, Peter and Ivan, who recently lost their father. Peter is in his thirties, balancing a career in law and the struggles of being involved with too many women at once. Meanwhile, Ivan is a 22-year-old chess prodigy who, as mentioned multiple times, will be getting his braces off shortly.
The novel begins with Peter’s point of view as he visits his much younger girlfriend, Naomi, after his dad’s funeral. Immediately, Rooney’s ability to reflect her characters’ complexities in her stylistic choices is evident. Peter is anxious, unsettled by his growing love for both Naomi and his ex-turned-best friend-turned-maybe more than that, Sylvia. In his sections, Rooney’s writing is disjointed and fragmented. “There is no one else, he could say. Someone, but not. I love you. Her. Both. Don’t worry. Don’t say it,” Rooney writes.
Throughout the novel, Rooney’s neglect for quotation marks blurs what’s said aloud and what is left unsaid. To readers and Rooney’s characters, the difference between outward reality and internal perception is unclear.
This haziness is interspersed with infrequent but cutting bluntness. As Peter processes his father’s death, sentences become more complete and ideas become fully formed. “Peter somehow inexcusably unprepared for the anticipated event. Somehow suddenly head of a family, which has at the same time ceased to exist,” Rooney writes.
At times, Rooney writes political commentary with similar frankness. Politics impact all of Rooney’s characters, and, at her best, she is able to interweave social commentary in a way that feels authentic to her characters. “The fact of Peter’s ongoing sexual and also quietly financial relationship, of eight month’s duration, with a participant in this particular illegal tenancy is, from the legal-philosophical, socio-political points of view, a thing of nothing,” Rooney writes.
There are, however, points when this political messaging takes readers out of the story with its explicitness. Considering his relationship with Naomi, Peter thinks, “Money overall a very exploitative substance, creating it seems fresh kinds of exploitation in every form of relationality through which it passes.” Here, her commentary is uninenvetive and feels disconnected from her characters.
When Rooney’s not writing general social commentary, the voice she gives her characters, especially Ivan, is strong and even what makes tham work as characters. Ivan could easily be a caricature of a chess genius, but the compassion Rooney writes with and the way she approaches his character development makes him complex and more likable.
At a chess exhibition, Ivan meets 36-year-old recent divorcée, Margaret. He thinks that, “Maybe if he hadn’t asked her that question she would have, because they were getting on better before. Now she probably thinks he’s psychotically fixated on chess and can’t talk about anything else: amazing how many people get that impression of him. Almost like there might be something to it.” Rooney highlights both Ivan’s anxieties and his self-awareness and self-criticism of his anxieties.
After the event, she drives him home, and a one-night stand turns into an unlabeled relationship. It’s this relationship that changes Ivan, who becomes more sure of himself and empathetic. While discussing Peter’s relationship with Sylvia, Ivan realizes that “Peter is speaking to him as an equal, someone who understands the complexities of life and intimate relationships: which, [Ivan] thinks, is exactly what he is, someone who has come to understand those complexities for himself. There are a lot of feelings there, Peter said, and Ivan knows exactly what he means.”
Ivan and Margaret’s relationship is also the basis of the deepening rift between the already-distant brothers. As one might imagine, Peter struggles to accept that he is uncomfortable with the age gap in his brother’s relationship despite being involved with 23-year-old Naomi. Still, Peter, like all of Rooney’s characters, is intermittently self-aware. “The sad thing is I actually liked her,” Peter tells his friend about Naomi. “but what can I do? I don’t know. I don’t want my brother ending up in the same situation she’s in. If this woman he’s seeing is as selfish as I am, he’s fucked.”
After a heated argument with Ivan that becomes physical, Peter retreats to his mother’s house. He grapples with his grief, his relationship with his brother, and his situation with Naomi and Sylvia that is, shockingly, breaking down. “In his thirties, to be staying at his mother’s house. But his dad died. Right, but they weren’t together. Why does it even matter,” Peter thinks.
In the end, it’s Peter who chooses to mend his relationship with Ivan. He visits him at a chess tournament, meets Margaret, and apologizes. The brothers get a happy ending, making tentative plans to spend Christmas together.
The relationship between Peter, Sylvia, and Naomi, however, gets an ambiguous ending. Peter is sure of his feelings for both Sylvia and Naomi, but unsure of how to move forward. Both women understand their circumstances but it is unclear what’s next. “You’re in love with her,” Sylvia says. “I know that, [Peter] says. I admitted it already. Don’t be accusatory about it. Palely smiling, she replies: I’m not.”
Unlikeable characters, meaningful commentary, and complicated relationships are not exclusive to Rooney, but her writing’s empathy and subtle flair set her apart from her contemporaries. Intermezzo highlights everything Rooney does well, and it might be her best work yet.
