puts her into the cart in which he transports the offal and meat-waste, covering her body with the detritus. He casually resumes his rounds and makes his way back to the abattoir, where he is apprehended by the police. He leads them on a wild goose chase for Mrs. Nugent's body, and escapes from them for a time, but he is recaptured and eventually imprisoned after revealing where her dismembered corpse is. Style The novel is written in a hybrid of first-person narrative and stream of consciousness, with little punctuation and no separation of dialogue and thought. Guathier, in examining the state of identity in the novel, explains that this style of writing forces the reader to "constantly [reassess] Francie Brady's psychological (in)stability [...] never quite sure to what extent Francie's perceptions are delusions or are incisive commentary on the narrow community in which he lives." Themes Like many other contemporary and modern pieces of Irish literature, The Butcher Boy addresses concerns about Ireland's neocolonial status. As Shahriyar Mansouri claims, the novel also examines the rise of a new wave of "decolonizing anarchic formations" in Ireland in the late 1960s and the 1970s, identifying split identity and non-conformism as outcries of a nation colonized by a post-colonial State. Critic Tim Guathier asserts that the crisis of identity which Francie experiences throughout the novel stems from the "unbalanced state" of Ireland and Irish identity. In particular, Guathier emphasizes that the instability of the community during the sixties—a time of rapid change and political violence within Ireland—shapes his dysfunctional family, and Francie's dysfunctional relationships with other characters such as Joe Purcell, and ensures that Francie does not feel part of the larger community, effectively turning him into the "Other". Film adaptation The book was adapted into a feature film directed by Neil Jordan in 1997. It starred Eamonn Owens as Francie, Stephen Rea as Benny and Fiona Shaw as Mrs. Nugent. The film was released on DVD on February 13, 2007. The film won the Silver Berlin Bear award for Best Director at the Berlin Film Festival in 1998 and a Special Mention for Owens' "astonishing lead". It also won the European Film Award for Best Cinematographer for Adrian Biddle. The adaptation is mostly faithful to the novel, but there are some differences, the principal change being the ending. In the book, Francie is not seen to leave prison, and attempts to