"The Thorn Birds" - anyone else here a fan?

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HomeschoolDad

HomeschoolDad

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Another novel I read about the same time was The Thorn Birds. I also saw the mini-series.

The book was good enough, but the mini-series was excellent. Richard Chamberlain played that role as no else could have.

I know that in very conservative Catholic circles, it was not well-liked because it portrayed immorality between a prelate and a young woman. I did not find it appealing for that reason, but because of its literary and cinematic excellence.
 
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I was a fan of it before I became Catholic, as I loved the “forbidden love” theme. It’s basically a high-quality soap opera, but none the less enjoyable for that. 🙂 Since becoming Catholic, it’s hard to view it in the same light, though; the love affair with the priest makes me cringe. (Not judging anyone who enjoys it; just sharing how my own perspective changed.)
 
I’m a huge fan, it’s one of my favorite books and one of my favorite film portrayals.

It’s not without its problems, though. It’s hard to watch Ralph see Meggie descend into anti-Theism and just allow it to happen. After all, Ralph took his vows with his own free will before he met her. But he lets Meggie blame God for keeping them apart.

The other thing is some of the theology is downright atrocious. For instance, when Ralph says that as a priest, he has to love everybody including Mary Carson, but as a lay person, Meggie is not required to love everybody.
Whu…?

But it does have interesting themes of family secrets and how we make choices and how the consequences of those choices are not in our control.
 
I have never read it or seen the movie because the subject matter, even as a teenager was unappealing because it involved a priest. I could not see how anyone was “cheering on” the relationship that involved a priest.

Let’s be honest, I didn’t want to think of Dr. Kildare as a priest. 😉
 
I watched the movie while sitting with my host family in Ireland…and was ashamed and embarrassed .The family didnt have quite the same values as I had ,I looked away but should have walked out.(was young and shy)
Sorry,thought it was a totally dumb movie 🙃
 
Miserable, horrid concept for a book. I did read it almost the whole way through as I had an English teacher in Catholic girls’ high school who thought it had lasting literary value. To me it read like another bodice ripper but with “forbidden love” between a worldly priest and some poor abused waif as the centerpiece. I didn’t like it. The same author wrote another book where an older woman has “forbidden love” with a hunky mentally challenged man. Which was also pretty gross.

I just don’t find priests as objects of graphically sexual romance novels to be appealing.

Needless to say I have never wasted my time watching the movie.
 
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Now they’re writing “Young Adult Fiction” for ages 12 and up that makes those old bodice rippers read like Heidi or something.
 
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I seem to recall reading an article recently on just what you mention - that there are a ton of Christian romance novels but not so many specifically Catholic. There have been some great Catholic romances make it to the screen - “The Quiet Man” and “Sound of Music” and I think there are some more set in Ireland or Italy.
 
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Kristen Lavransdattir is a pretty miserable book though. Not a happy ending book. I may try to read it again sometime, I hear there is a new translation of it.
 
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The plot’s content doesn’t really appeal to me.
 
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That’s probably the one I read and enjoyed. Then again, I love long stories. . .Lord of the Rings. . .War and Peace. . .Michener’s “Hawaii”, etc.
oh, and Ramona, by Helen Hunt Jackson. Kind of sad in parts but it’s been a favorite of mine.

Of course all the best fairy tales are Catholic, and Robin Hood, and the Arthurian romances, and Chaucer’s Canterbury Tales. . . Ivanhoe. . .
Thomas B. Costain’s novels too involve some Catholic heroes and heroines. . . The Black Rose is based on the legend of the parents of St. Thomas A Becket, The Moneyman is set in Catholic France, etc.
 
I remember the miniseries when it was on tv, but I never watched it nor read the book. I was not Catholic at the time.
 
My grandmother LOVED the miniseries when it came out, I’m told. So we got the DvDs for her for Christmas.

Upon watching it again 40 years later. She didn’t like it.
 
The book was way better. The Ralph/Meggie storyline was a smaller part of it and the author delved into the other characters and their motivations in a lot more depth,

The character of Fee is a good example of self-absorption gone unchecked. She doesn’t get the ending she wants and then treats herself to a decades-long sulk.
And it ends very badly for her as she loses the people she does care about one by one.
 
My mom like it. She had the Italian translation of the book.

I never saw the miniseries and I read perhaps a half page of the book many years ago. I had gone away with friends to their beach house, it was one of the books on the shelf. I think I fell asleep reading it.
 
Generations of Catholic women who find those movies very romantic would disagree with you 🙂

A “Catholic romance”, like a “Christian romance”, is simply a romance where the characters and their romance follow a particular religion, the principles of which religion underscore the romance. It’s not like you have to have one of the romantic partners being a priest or a minister to have such a story.
 
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Romances ARE fairytales. The actual story of the Trapp Family was not just like “The Sound of Music”.

I don’t think you’re the target audience for romances here, it seems you don’t really understand the concept. Plus, you’re a guy, so maybe that explains why.
 
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I’m sending in Kirby the Exorcist. Poyo!
 
I personally rarely watch anything made after 2000.
I’ve been watching “The Molly Maguires” with Sean Connery and Richard Harris this week, great movie though its miserable (but true) ending probably contributed to the box office failure.
 
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