40 pages • 1 hour read
Anne EnrightThe Gathering
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 2007A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 15-21Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 15 Summary
In Veronica’s memories of living with Ada, she realizes that she is confusing her sister Kitty’s stories as her own. She recalls Ada’s garden and Nugent coming over often with his tools. Nugent would bring candy for Veronica and her siblings. Even as a child, Veronica could tell that Nugent was in love with Ada.
Chapter 16 Summary
Veronica imagines why Ada chose Charlie over Nugent. Nugent, Charlie, and Ada attend the horse races and place bets. Nugent is discouraged and frustrated by his losses. When Ada’s horse wins, Nugent is disappointed and annoyed, while Charlie is happy for her. Ada chooses Charlie because he supported her when Nugent couldn’t.
Chapter 17 Summary
Chapter 18 Summary
Veronica recalls visiting Liam in England while she was in university. One summer, Veronica stayed with Liam in a house where a drug dealer would sell from the basement. This house was shared by random young people. Veronica didn’t like the house and wanted a more normal way of living; this was when she decided that “there must be a path—and Liam had wandered off it, and I wasn’t going out there to look for him—not this time” (123).
Chapter 19 Summary
Throughout the years, Veronica recognized that Liam was chaotic and made people feel uncomfortable because he was brutally honest and never censored himself. He liked to make others uncomfortable, but he couldn’t help it; “It was like a contagion, he just had a contagious mind” (125).
Ada sent Kitty and Veronica to Catholic school while they were in her care. Veronica liked the bloodier stories about saints. She would experiment with cutting herself throughout her youth.
Chapter 20 Summary
After Liam’s funeral, Veronica loses touch with her ability to experience things as real. She doubts that she and Tom share the same memories. She watches Tom get aroused in his sleep and wonders if he is thinking of her.
Chapter 21 Summary
Veronica imagines a scene in which Nugent and Ada, now in their forties and fifties, spend time alone while Charlie is out. Nugent has a nice wife and four children, but he is unhappy. Veronica considers that Ada and Nugent may have had an affair, but she thinks it’s more likely that they remained friends while knowing privately their hidden love for one another. Veronica figures that she, like most people, invests sex with too much meaning: “[T]here is something so banal about things that happen behind closed doors, these terrible transgressions that are just sex after all” (140).
Chapters 15-21 Analysis
These chapters reveal more of Liam’s character development. Liam’s death by suicide can be traced back to certain behavioral changes throughout his youth. Veronica was aware of these shifts and acknowledges that as much as she loved Liam, his chaos was often too much to deal with. Veronica remembers Liam as “a completely shocking human being, but it was hard to say what exactly he had done to make you feel so off-key” (125). She characterizes him as having a brutal honesty that made other people feel uncomfortable, but this honesty was not within his control. Liam is therefore characterized as inherently different from other people because he didn’t have the social tact to make situations pleasant. Veronica addresses Liam’s characterization as a way of feeling compassion for someone who was, in life, difficult to deal with.
Uncle Brendan’s story develops the theme of The Influence of Family History. Veronica’s uncle was hospitalized in a time when people didn’t understand or have a great deal of empathy for those with mental health conditions. His family therefore chose to send him away rather than support him. Although Liam grows up in a different era, his loved ones are similarly reluctant to address his mental health conditions head-on. This lack of support alienates Liam and ultimately drives him out of Ireland.
Veronica continues to navigate The Impact of Death and Grief by playing with the past. Veronica projects her own desire for logic and explanation onto what may or may not have been Ada’s love life. Ultimately, Ada’s choice to marry Charlie and not Nugent is indicative of her autonomy and the power of choice, but Veronica wrests narrative control back from Ada, making the story about the ghost of what could have been to suggest that Ada’s choice not to marry Nugent changed the course of everyone’s life. Notably, Veronica has a flash of self-insight here as she reflects that “there is something so banal about things that happen behind closed doors” (140). For a moment she recognizes that reimagining Ada’s life might not give her the insight or control she craves.
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By Anne Enright
