Beautiful World, Where Are You
Beautiful World, Where Are You
Rooney's most ambitious novel. Two women writing emails about the apocalypse and trying to love people in the ruins. The question is urgent.
Alice and Eileen
Sally Rooney's 2021 novel follows Alice, a famous novelist recovering from a breakdown, and Eileen, her best friend working for a literary magazine in Dublin, whose long email correspondence forms the philosophical spine of the book. In between, they pursue their own precarious relationships. Alice is unsettled by Felix, a warehouse worker she meets on a dating app. Eileen is tangled with Simon, a man she has loved since childhood. The emails ask large questions about civilisation, desire, and whether beauty is worth caring about when the world is obviously falling apart. A number one bestseller in the UK, US, and Ireland.
Reading Beautiful World, Where Are You
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"Why would anyone want to be interesting? To have an interesting life? Interesting to whom?
"Sally Rooney · Beautiful World Where Are You
Rooney published the novel in 2021, the same year she was named on the Time 100 list. She has spoken about writing it during the pandemic and said the anxiety in the book is not metaphorical.
The title comes from a 1788 elegy by Friedrich Schiller asking where beauty has gone from a world consumed by commerce and conflict. Rooney said reading it felt like an exact description of the present moment.