Summary

Summary

The book is mainly about Sharons pregnancy, but also about the community they are living in. The main characters live in Barrytown, where they call a little baby for a snapper. The book is about Sharons pregnancy and her expecting a baby, therefore the name, “the Snapper”. The book is about the working class family, the Rabbittes. The environment is not ideal for a baby. They live in small houses with many children. It is also lack of work and a lot of heavy drinking. The people there seem to be very close. “The Snapper” is a novel who contains alcohol abuse, rape, adultery and pregnancy. The writer of the book is Roddy Doyle. He is a novelist, dramatist and screenwriter from Ireland. Doyle won the famous Booker Prize in 1993.

The Snapper is all about togetherness, even if it doesn’t seems like it in the beginning. The Rabitte family argues a lot and uses though words. It is the way they speech in Barrytown and it is not a good place for children to grow up. Swearing and fuming are a part of their daily speech. The children are brought up to be hard and strong to stand up to the bullies. But also their parents are saying pert words to their kids. In the start of the book, they almost seem to hate each other.

When Sharon found out that she was pregnant, she didn’t want to move out of the house, but then she didn’t got along with her dad like she did before. Sharon’s father is angry with her because she says it is a Spanish sailor that is the father of her unborn baby. He stays mad at her for some weeks, but when she talks to him she says that she is moving out he changes his mind. This makes him forgive her and he begs her not to move out. Actually she isn’t moving out, she just wants her father to remember how much he realy loves her. Her father also had to take a lot of shit at the pub, because of Sharon’s unborn baby. The guys there had heard rumours about George Burgess, who was a married man and about Sharon.

All characters without Sharon wonders who the father of the baby really is. She tells them that it was a random Spanish sailor that she met at the local pub. They want to and says that they believe her, but they really do not. This novel takes place in a little town called Barrytown in Ireland. It is a place where everyone knows everyone and they talk scandal about each other. They are a pretty poor family even though their father work all day, like Sharon before she got pregnant.

Sources:

http://www.daria.no/skole/?tekst=1899 http://www.daria.no/skole/?tekst=91 The book, "The Snapper".