Maggie O'Farrell's 10th novel, Land, opens in 1865 on a rainswept Irish peninsula, beginning a lengthy and ambitious story set in the aftermath of the Irish famine. The book traces two generations of a family, with gestures backward and forward to two more, taking readers from Dublin to Rome, Quebec, and Kerala.
The opening line came to O'Farrell on a train journey from Belfast to Dublin, becoming the gateway to a story based partly on her great-great-grandfather, who worked for the Ordnance Survey in Ireland after the Great Hunger. 'What, I wondered, would it have been like to be revising the maps at that time,' she writes in an introductory note, 'to be recording and setting down the devastation that had occurred?'
Mapping the Peninsula
In bitter weather, Tomás and his 10-year-old son Liam survey a peninsula—perhaps Dunmore Head in County Kerry—using poles and measuring chains. Tomás works for the English, valued for his surveying skills and language abilities, as he untangles local legends and obscure toponyms to create a usable map. A famine survivor scarred by trauma, he tolerates the English taking credit for his work, knowing that learning the surveyor's trade was his escape from the workhouse.
On the promontory, Tomás discovers a forgotten woodland around an ancient well. Drinking its water transforms him: he becomes voluble and loving, but also raves with visions, unable to work for the English. Liam must stop him from destroying his work and get him home to his wife Phina and daughters Enda and Rose. Phina is expecting a fourth child, Eugene, whose story closes the book. The legend of the well, with a talking fish, a wise dog, and a gold ring, echoes Celtic mythology.
Narrative Style and Structure
The book opens with an epigraph defining 'seanchaí' as 'custodian of tradition, historian' and 'reciter of ancient lore; traditional story-teller.' O'Farrell adopts this role, weaving fable-like elements into realist passages, using direct address, coincidence, and shifting time. The point of view moves between humans, two dogs, an unborn child, a house, the land, and an omniscient perspective that foretells the future. These elements suggest Land is more an act of traditional storytelling than a conventional novel.
However, this choice results in sparse dialogue, with speech often reported rather than rendered. This makes the book dense and reduces opportunities to reveal character through voice. Without enough dialogue, many characters feel less rounded, making their journeys from tragedy to tragedy demanding. The narrative unfolds episodically, lacking the causality that gives fiction meaning.
Cinematic Potential
O'Farrell co-wrote the screenplay for Hamnet, nominated for several awards, and the rights to Land have been acquired by the same production company. Some scenes describe movements from an external, visual perspective, as in a script: 'He fits his hat to his head … then leaves.' As a novel, Land feels uncomfortable in its own skin, neither fable nor history nor family saga. But with its narrator absent and characters brought to life by actors, it will likely make an epic film.
Land by Maggie O'Farrell is published by Tinder (£25).
