Review of the Butcher Boy by Pat Mccabe

Review of ‘The Butcher Boy’, By Pat McCabe.

This review will examine the central character explicitly, Francie Brady, his inherent characteristics, and what makes him who he is, a divided self. Francie dithered between reality and fantasy and this may go a long way to explain his deteriorating mental state. In exploration of the effects of his parent’s death upon him, one witnesses how loss surrounded the protagonist’s life from an early stage and how loss dramatically formed him as an individual.

The story is overall, quite sad. It shows how easy it is for an individual to be side-lined by society and for people to not understand when someone is in need of help. This tragic story sees Francie Brady, his childhood events and the circumstances of his childhood, from his own childlike point of view. The reader is left as troubled as the narrator, Francie, in the end, with the reader questioning Francie’s mental health. The story highlights how easily society turns a blind eye on those who are suffering and crying out for help in an indirect way. Francie suffers betrayal at the hands of his parents, friends and neighbours. Betrayal however, plays a larger, more significant role in the story; a wife betrayed by her husband, son and neighbour and it is this betrayal that ultimately leads to the climactic point of the book.

Francie succumbs to guilt following his Mother’s death leaving him disorientated and therefore unable to deal with the death of his Father. Abandonment becomes an issue for young Francie and following his friend’s desertion Francie appears outrageous to the reader. ‘Pigs – shur the whole town knows that.’ (p. 4.) This declaration from Mrs. Nugent was the beginning with Francie’s preoccupation with pigs. His preoccupation was caused by the realisation that she may be correct and also his vain hope that his family were not indeed pigs. Francie invents the pig toll tax and Mrs. Nugent would have to pay when she passed on the...