No comments, just questions:

What are the unheard messages?

Why didn’t Eileen and Simon spend the Sunday together?

Are they a couple now? Do they really love each other?

What does the story have to do with Socialism or Communism? No, I didn’t read the interview. I don’t think one should have to read an interview to understand the story.

Thanks for your insights.

I guess one comment: This is the blandest narrative style in a long time.

Don’t know if this will answer your questions, William, but here are my thoughts:
That the story is delivered in a flat, almost deadpan manner left me guessing about Eileen’s internal experience. At the same time, the descriptions of minute details gave me the sense of watching things through her eyes. I found this intriguing, and did not lose interest despite the mundaneness of much of the goings-on (I think this is where the tired and naïve discussion of communism comes in. It also introduces the topic of beliefs — frivolous and profound — which is important later on.)
I found the uncertainty about the eventual outcome was resolved by the church scene, in which Simon reveals a calmness and confidence that seems connected to his deep religious feelings, contrasting with Eileen’s uncertainty and aimlessness. Perhaps his communion with God, incomprehensible to—and excluding of —Elaine, is what the title refers to. Of course, there are unheard messages throughout, not the least of which is that although Simon is willing to accept Eileen’s adoration, he will never reciprocate her romantic love. By the end of the story, there is a true sense that they live emotionally in different worlds.

She’s lonely and uninvolved with life. She wants to be in love with him but isn’t, though she wants him to be a constant in her life. He likes her but isn’t in love with her. Her life sounds humdrum. He has his religion but she doesn’t have much of anything outside of a stultifying job, while he’s an attorney moving up the success ladder. They appear not to read, watch television or have any creative outlets. She is detached from concerns such as climate change, racial inequities or politics. She spends most of her work time on the computer and her free time on social media via her phone, to which she is greatly attached. She has no close friends but knows several people with whom she spends time, mostly in pubs. She seems unmoved by her ex-roommate’s severe mental problems. She and he might eventually marry but probably won’t. If they do marry it will be unsatisfying. Their relationship will probably grow more tenuous over time, especially if he continues to become more involved in his work and she stays in her dead-end job. It’s a sad story concerned with shallowness and unremitting loneliness, but Rooney describes it beautifully.

I’m quite intrigued by the conversation here because I seem to have had a different take on the story. First, I would agree the style is perhaps “bland” BUT it seemed SO bland that it almost seem “meta”–as if she’s just not going to be bothered with certain niceties.

I also found the main character as clear (or as clear enough as Rooney wanted her to be) in her character psychology. She seemed like many over-educated people who then become white-collar workers and are too tired out after work to maybe read the literature they once enjoyed and find that the omnipresent screens in our pockets are an easy and quick source of amusement. Eileen’s relation with Simon also seemed quite clear. They are good friends and I don’t believe at this point either wants to be involved in a serious relationship with the other but he is definitely there for her (I wonder what’d happen if HE needed HER one night). As for why they split up that day, it seems like they’ve had a lovely time together. She’s been intrigued by his religiousness and now gets a glimpse at it. But…they both probably have other plans for the day and so off they go. I’d assume they’ve had “casual” sex on other occasions.

Rooney’s theme of the blurring of friend and lover is also explored in ‘Normal People’–caveat–I didn’t read it but saw the very fine British miniseries of it.

Under the cool tone, I found this moving and quite satisfying.

Good catch, Ken! The thing is, all the text and social media messages*are*read. The unread messages are contained in Simon’s interactions with Eileen, which are based on his unfailing kindness, which is based in fondness, yes, but could fall under the category of Christian charity. What came across to me on the second reading was Eileen’s lack of self-awareness. What I wondered was whether Simon’s kindness was truly helpful to her or not.

Good thought, Louise, but I think it would have to be Simon who does the “letting go”. I doubt that Eileen would be able to manage that, at least at this point in their lives.

Gavin,
When Sally Rooney’s “Unread Messages” is published or the novel it is an excerpt from, some readers may think it is not a particularly good short story or it will not be a good novel. But remember the big 5 publishers are looking for a book to sell that is read by many and liked well enough so that they get a good return on their investment. Just something we’ll written is not good enough if not enough people will buy and read it. An exception might be an earlier novel called “The Mars Room” by Rachel Kushner from which an excerpted short story was published in The New Yorker but the novel was not a best seller. Yet it later won a the French Prix Médicis Etranger literary award in 2018. And it was also on the Man Booker Prize shortlist of that year. The big literary award winners or best written novels need a few good money making novels in their portfolio to stay solvent. Some have survived by being merged into larger publishers but the commercial literary landscape remains somewhat grim.

I love the POV here, and it makes me wonder why the third person omniscient style became largely abandoned around a hundred years ago. (I’m not a literary person so my chronology may be way off but you hopefully get my point). Interesting and highly developed characters, and I enjoy the precise and realistic details. Quite a few comments on this thread seem factually wrong. The main character is “Eileen”, not “Elaine”. I doubt whether Simon’s an attorney since his first degree was in philosophy rather than law, but maybe I missed some other reference. The discussion of communism, although brief, is very far from “tired and naive”. However, this is just a difference of opinion between me and the other commenter. To me, the exposition of the two categories of “working-class” that are discussed — the Marxist sense and the identity sense — makes an important point very well and succinctly. However, a less indulgent reader than myself could very well argue that the political discussion felt like the writer was lecturing to the reader, and was outside the main narrative flow.

I didn’t like this story. Is this a style or an abdication of style? Yes, it’s flat and supposed to be evocative, but it’s also boring, and the details are unconnected to the story. All characters are given only a first name? Why? Deliberate, of course, to make the whole story–characters, plot, description–as flat as possible. I know Rooney has many fans, and I’ve read both of her novels, but the prose in this excerpt seems even duller than the prose in her novels. Plus, she is recycling characters and even plot points. If one reads her work, back to back, you don’t see a growth of style or more development of theme, or even variation in characters. I think the appeal in her work is that she’s digging into what goes on between people who have fairly one-dimensional lives. Granted, I think NORMAL PEOPLE is a reasonably good novel (and an even better film, thanks to great acting). I think her brief forays into issues of religion and politics is more interesting than the interactions of the characters in this story. Is this good writing? Is this even good fiction? She’s obviously a commercial success, but I wonder if she’s really moving in an artistic direction that will present readers with deeper stories, more interesting characters, and more coherent themes. IMHO she runs the risk of continuing to repeat herself without really growing or maturing as a writer. But the books sell. And the fans want more of the same.

Impressive how Rooney’s story has generated so much comment. And divided into 2 camps. Callie — I’m looking forward to reading that link.

Thanks, Callie. I read the essay, since I’m not going to read the novel. I have “Normal People” on my ebook list, and I will stop with that.

Several comments after reading the book review:

— Book reviewers are all about showing how smart they are. This guy says Rooney has a “depressive, evacuated style that Ernest Hemingway made his signature.” What crap.

— The Atlantic reviewer cites another reviewer: “Rothfeld went so far as to dismiss Rooney’s fiction as “sanctimony literature”: “full of self-promotion and the airing of performatively righteous opinions.”” More crap. What does that even mean? “Self-promotion and the airing of performatively righteous opinions” more describes a book review.

— The book review enlightens us about some of the puzzles in the short story and shows that excerpts from a novel can be pretty much useless as standalone pieces. Like this: “college-age leftists of an idealistic sort and, like tyro intellectuals since the dawn of time, are deadly earnest without altogether knowing what they’re talking about”: So that’s the context of the brief political interchange in the bar. We also learn that Rooney is a Marxist, further enlightenment.

— There is also further context on Simon’s religiosity: the title of the new novel echoes “a poem of Friedrich Schiller’s praising a mythic past when contact with the divine was part of daily life.”

We discussed a lot about Eileen’s isolation. In the novel this is not such a theme, I don’t think, or at least is made less bizarre. Again, some novel excerpts can stand alone. This one doesn’t. Which is the root of our lack of understanding of the characters.

My last comments:

I re-read some of Carver’s classic stories. Rooney is not one of his descendants. It insults Carver to connect him with Rooney.

I re-read some of Alice Munro’s classics. So good. I know that no one connected her to Rooney. But my conclusion is that I would rather re-read some vintage Munro than Rooney.

I read several chapters of “Normal People”. Mildly interesting. What is clear is that it is way different from the New Yorker excerpt of Rooney’s upcoming novel.

Two possible conclusions: one, that Rooney drastically changed her style; two, that the excerpt does not accurately represent the new book. I tend to favor the latter idea. Which might explain the vagueness and ambiguity of the excerpt.