The Temporary Gentleman is Sebastian Barry’s third novel to explore the McNulty family.

This time the tale is recounted by Jack McNulty, who we first met as a boy in The Whereabouts of Eneas McNulty and later in The Secret Scripture. Now, in 1957, he’s a man who is narrating his troubled history from Accra, Ghana.

The Irishman’s intense story begins when he holds a temporary commission as an engineer in the British army during World War II. His troopship is torpedoed off Gold Coast, near Accra, by a German U-boat.

The Temporary Gentleman, by Sebastian Barry,
Allen & Unwin, $29.99

It’s the explosions and actions and sudden trauma that fix this novel in its place. Yet it is in between the exploits and conflict that we learn most about Jack as a man and human being. He’s vague and ambiguous with not much feeling towards anyone, especially his wife Mai, whom he treats badly.

By the time Jack begins writing his memoir, the war has been over for 12 years and the Gold Coast has turned into Ghana. Jack thinks soon he’ll go back home to Sligo in Ireland; he must go back – he has duties there, not least to his children – but he’s selfish and guilt-ridden and his unclear revelations are a kind of awkward, remorseful and apologetic explanation for his culpability.

Barry’s restrained characterisation is almost poetic in a lucid and spare style, yet the language flows with a fluidity that washes the reader along with the memoir.

Jack blunders along and squanders his money, and much of his life is shaped by alcoholism and various harrowing events. He holds back details in his narrative as if he’s embarrassed to tell the entire truth. This allows readers to read between the lines and complete the picture in their own minds. In many cases, this would be a recipe for disaster, but in the capable hands of an excellent storyteller it works a treat.