Summer Reads: THE QUIET MAN, by Maurice Walsh July 16, 2008

The week of short stories continues.

 Anyone who followed our writings over at the Purple Hearts, knows how I feel about cadence. Sometimes, the cadence of a a story tells as much as the words. The Quiet Man is just such a story.

This is another great short and great movie that have little to do with one another – yet, I highly recommend them both. As usual, the movie can’t help but adding an obvious motive and expressing it more clearly than a man at the running of the brides.

 

Sometimes a man just wants to escape himself. That’s what Shawn Kelvin does when he returns home from America. Instead of fighting for his family’s farm, he takes a quaint cottage on the hillside, as distant and quiet as he is.  Knowing that he’s come to care for the only woman he cannot court, the sister of the man who stole his family’s farm, he remains content.

 

Until. . . .well, untill you read the story for yourself and find the hidden strength the man carries within himself. Very few stories show this preciesly the importance of knowing who you are and being confident in it.

 

Plus, I mean, played by John Wayne. . . .just saying