Paddy Clarke ha ha ha by Roddy Doyle

Never mind judging a book by its cover, I had slight reservations about this book since looking at the list of titles!  It just didn’t seem to make any sense, or conform to any ideas about what a title should be.  And actually that kind of sums up the book.  There is no overriding plot, just random episodes or fragments of memories of a boy growing up in Ireland in 1968.  Although written in the past tense, the direct speech, punctuated only by a dash, strengthens the intimacy through which Paddy’s existence is conveyed and the reader is made to experience his every thought and feeing, as the writing captures the rhythms of children’s speech. 

Doyle transports an adult mind fantastically well into that of a ten year old boy as he careers around among his gang of friends, within his family and at school.  The child’s viewpoint is so revealing, especially his fears about his parents arguments and how he feels responsible.  In fact what I think this novel expresses so brilliantly is the complexity of thoughts and feelings within a child’s mind and how that often contrasts with their behaviour, the games that they play to be part of the hierarchy of their friends.  I really loved the descriptions of Paddy’s surroundings from a child’s perspective, in particular the detail of his memories; the colours of his family’s toothbrushes, their hot water bottles, where the squeaks on the stairs are, basically the things that children notice as being interesting and important but are often overlooked by adults.  Furthermore, Paddy’s endless interest in everything, the discovery of new facts, the excitement of learning new things, the significance of each detail on a child’s scale.

The most impressive aspect of this fascinating book was how amongst the rough and tumble of this boy’s life, and the relentlessness of the random tangents of his interest, Doyle manages to weave a very personal and touching thread of feeling throughout the story which is incredibly endearing and compassionately human.  The perceptive nature of this novel, conveyed from the developing logic of a ten year old is a real joy to read, especially when the story telling is so amusing and the stance of the book is so unusual.  In fact it inhabits the bittersweet nature of childhood magnificently; the freedom and the fun but also the lack of control and limited experience and understanding of the adult world, that can be so baffling as a child.