Old friends? Representations of ageing, masculinity and friendship in two novels by Hermann Kinder and Roddy Doyle

As a flexible and elective bond that can expand and contract, friendship is an important interpersonal connection based on reciprocal goodwill that can endure across the life course. Friends can help each other by listening and providing emotional support as well as camaraderie. They create opportunities for social engagement and also challenge each other. Gerontological literature and research often highlight that having friends and close ties with families can help older adults to be more socially and psychologically well-adjusted and research on friendship and ageing often centres on the contribution of friends to psychological wellbeing. Focusing on the intersection of ageing, masculinity and friendship, this article explores this topic from a different angle. It examines two novels by the Irish author Roddy Doyle and the German author Hermann Kinder that explore male friendship as a site where men express, script and perform masculinities together, investigating their reflections on how to be an ageing man. The friendships described in these texts include long-term but thinned‑out relationships, and opportunistic, temporary but thickened bonds, showing that different relationships and bonds can be useful to and important for individuals at different stages of the life course.