Sister Imelda Edna O\' Brien\'s

Sister Imelda

Edna O' Brien's Short Story "Sister Imelda": A Reading Pleasure and a Moral Education Combined

The short story "Sister Imelda" (1981) by Irish author Edna O'Brien is a delight to read, due to O'Brien's descriptive writing style; her characterizations of nuns and students at a strict Irish Catholic convent school (especially the main character/narrator; her best friend Baba; and the seductive but sad Sister Imelda herself), and various interpersonal and other conflicts that well up within the main characters, right from the start. Also entertaining is the way O' Brien takes the reader inside the closed and remote world of an Irish Catholic convent school, with its myriad rules, restrictions, and joyless routines. (for example, even on the very first day of the new school year, the narrator and Baba, after trying and failing to get a look at Sister Imelda "to see what she looked like," no doubt their greatest excitement of the day, are already "dreaming of our final escape, which would be in a year" (p. 405). Sister Imelda's lesbianism is an important underlying motif in that it implies the importance of coming to know oneself, for oneself, and only then for others. "Sister Imelda" provides other educational insights as well. One, related in some ways to the lesbian motif, is the necessity of facing the truth -- about oneself and about others. A second is honoring one's feelings, even if doing so should disappoint others. A third is the importance of facing oneself and others with honesty and courage.

From the beginning, it is clear that the narrator is fascinated and infatuated with Sister Imelda. All the girls notice her and make comments about her. According to Baba "her eyes were like blackberries" and "with makeup Imelda would be a cinch" (p. 406). The narrator wants to know all about Sister Imelda, especially after they become special friends, more so than the usual teacher and student. As she asks her one day, "Sister, did you ever ride a motorbicycle [sic]?"...

Sister, did you ever wear seamless stockings?"... Sister, what's your favorite film star -- male?" (p. 415). To the narrator, Sister Imelda is fascinating, yet not quite real. Yet, as the narrator also begins to realize at times, through the haze of her schoolgirl infatuation with Sister Imelda, the nun is really just an ordinary human being:

Yes, she had ridden a motorbicycle [sic], and she had worn silk stockings, but they were seamed. She liked bananas best, and if she had a wish it would be to go home for a few hours to see her parents and brother. (p. 415)

And when Sister Imelda's only brother dies later on, in a van accident, Sister Imelda grieves deeply, just as the narrator, Baba, or anyone else would at the death of a brother or sister of their own.