The South is a 1990 novel by Irish writer Colm Tóibín. The idea for The South came to Tóibín in 1982 whilst on a train from Dublin to his native town of Enniscorthy. He observed a fellow passenger, a well-dressed woman "rich—not gaudy rich, but old rich", whom he took to be a Protestant. She continued to figure in his mind. He spent three years working on the novel, by night and at the weekend.