The Bee Sting by Paul Murray was published in 2023 and shortlisted for the Booker Prize. It’s set in present day Ireland and follows the lives of a dyThe Bee Sting by Paul Murray was published in 2023 and shortlisted for the Booker Prize. It’s set in present day Ireland and follows the lives of a dysfunctional family of four who are each struggling with their own issues centered around the father’s failing business. It deals with themes of climate change, sexuality, consumerism, infidelity, and domestic violence. It is at times funny, but mostly dark.
At one point, a minor character in the novel gives a speech about climate change that really resonated with me. It struck me that perhaps Murray’s whole purpose in writing this novel was to give voice to that speech. And that speech seems to me to be a solution to our current political crisis though I doubt such a movement would ever gather momentum because it does not center around hating an enemy. It has to do with shedding the false version of ourselves that everyone creates to hide their vulnerability and need.
Here is a portion of that speech:
“The sad truth is that right now, at the worst possible moment, we’re being deluged in new ways to hide. So let me be clear. Togetherness is crucial, if we’re to tackle something as total as climate change. Banging your own little drum, demanding everyone look at your mask, be it a consumer status symbol or one of sexuality or race or religious belief or whatever else, that will do no good. Division will do no good. You may gain some attention for your particular subgroup, there may even be minor accommodations made. But you are moving deckchairs on a sinking ship, diversity deckchairs. Global apocalypse is not interested in your identity politics or who you pray to or what side of the border you live on. Cis, trans, black, white, scientist, artist, basketball player, priest—every stripe of person, every colour and creed, we are all going to be hit by this hammer. And that is another fact that unites us. We are all alive together in this sliver of time in which the human race decides whether or not it will come to an end. As the poet says, We must love one another, or die. And from bitter experience I know that you can’t love when you’re wearing a mask.�
This novel has faint glimmers of hope, but the hope is mostly smothered.
Another quote I want to remember:
“He would have to fight, he would have to try to protect them, even though he knew it was impossible to win. You couldn’t protect the people you loved—that was the lesson of history, and it struck him therefore that to love someone meant to be opened up to a radically heightened level of suffering.�...more
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