Nora: Exploring the experiences of Nora Barnacle

A novel exploring the experiences of Nora Barnacle, best known as James Joyce’s wife and muse, has been selected as this year’s book for the One Dublin One Book 2022 initiative.

‘NORA’ is written by Palmerstown native Nuala O’Connor, a seasoned author who has written a number of novels and short story and poetry collections, both under her English name and as Nuala Ní Chonchúir.

The novel is narrated by Nora, and delves into her relationship with James Joyce and has been described by Publisher’s Weekly as adding to “the abundant Joyceana with a moving examination of an unforgettable family”.

The book is this year’s selection for One Dublin One Book – a Dublin City Council initiative led by Dublin City Libraries, which encourages everyone to read a book connected with the capital city during the month of April every year.

Nuala, who is a past pupil of Pobalscoil Iosolde, told The Echo about her favourite childhood authors, why she felt moved to write a book centred on Nora Barnacle, and her thoughts on ‘NORA’ being this year’s One Dublin One Book choice.

What was your favourite book when you were growing up?

I had a lot of favourites. I was one of those kids who was always reading. I was born in 1970, so I read all the usual books of that time: Enid Blyton’s ‘Famous Five’ series, and Noel Streatfeild’s ‘Ballet Shoes’, and I loved Irish authors like Eilís Dillon and Carolyn Swift.

When did you realise you wanted to become a writer?

I was always writing as a child – I kept a diary and I wrote poems. One of my poems came second in a national poetry competition.

It was about Traveller children, and I wrote it in Irish. That gave me a taste for writing as something that was possible [as a career].

Can you remember what the first story you ever wrote was like, and how do you feel now looking back on it?

I wrote stories as a kid that I never finished, usually about dynamic girls, and a couple of novels had false starts later.

One was about a loner woman in Scotland, another about a German artist. Unfinished work is abandoned for many reasons – if your heart isn’t in it, it can be hard to press on.

You have to love what you’re writing.

Your latest book, ‘NORA’, looks at the life of Nora Barnacle – James Joyce’s wife and muse. What is it about Nora’s life that you found so ripe for inspiration that it prompted you to write this book?

She was a natural maverick. She went against everything that would have been expected of her by eloping to Europe with Joyce.

She always seemed such a practical, earthy woman and I knew that by inspiring and propping up Joyce, Nora would be interesting to follow in a novel-length work, and she was.

What was the most surprising thing you learned about Nora Barnacle when you were writing the book?

Human nature doesn’t surprise me, generally, so her stoicism and optimism in the face of many hardships didn’t surprise me.

I was surprised to learn she had survived cancer – I didn’t remember that from my first reading of Brenda Maddox’s biography of Nora, when it came out in the 80s.

‘NORA’ was recently selected as the One Dublin One Book choice for 2022. What does it mean, to you, that your book was picked for this?

As a hungry reader, a writer, and a proud Dub, it’s such an honour to represent my city and county – and reading – with a book that means a lot to me.

‘NORA’ is out now. For more information on One Dublin One Book 2022, visit One Dublin One book.