O’Brien’s coming-of-age classic loses its edge in nostalgic adaptation

Grace Collender and Lola Petticrew in The Country Girls by Edna O’Brien Pic: Ros Kavanagh

The Country Girls

Abbey Theatre, Dublin

Rating: **

Until April 6

When it was first published in 1960, Edna O’Brien’s novel The Country Girls was immediately banned by the Irish Censorship Board. The chief objections to the book - the first instalment of what would become a trilogy - were O’Brien’s representation of emergent female sexuality and her protagonist’s affair with a married man. The book was burned on the altar of several ...