Dominic Behan

Life
1928-1989 [var. 1923]; brother of Brendan Behan and Brian Behan; son of Kathleen Behan; left Ireland in 1947; lived in London and Glasgow; active in trade union movement in Dublin and London; contrib. to Life, Hibernia, Sunday Standard, Dublin Evening Herald, Scotsman, and London Evening Standard; as well as TV documentaries and broadcasting for BBC, Tyneside [Tyne Tees]; RTÉ, and Scottish TV; a play, Posterity Be Damned, performed in Dublin (Gaiety 28 Feb. 1960) and moved to London (March 20 1960) where it was the scene of drunken demonstrations by Brendan; issued My Brother Brendan (1965); issued Teems of Times and Happy Returns (1961), an autobiography; among numerous ballads his best-known is “The Patriot Game”, a cynical treatment of militant nationalism which was echoed in Bob Dylan’s ballad, ‘With God on Our Side” - giving rise to a law-suit in which Behan was awarded a small sum. DIW FDA

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Works
Teems of Times and Happy Returns (London: Heinemann 1961) [autobiog.]; My Brother Brendan (London: Leslie Frewin 1965), 159pp.; with George Tardios, A Morden Tower Reading (Newcastle-upon-Tyne: Morden Tower Publications 1976), 19pp.; Milligan: The Life and Times of Spike Milligan (London: Methuen 1988); The Public World of Parable Jones (London: Collins 1989), 206pp. [novel].

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Quotations
“The Patriot Game”: ‘Come all you young rebels and list while I sing / For love of one’s land is a dangerous thing / It banishes fear with the speed of a flame / And it makes us all part of the patriot game // My name is O’Hanlon and I’ve just gone sixteen / My home is in Monaghan and there I was weaned ... / I was taught all my life to hold England to blame / So I became part of the Patriot Game. // It’s barely two years since I wandered away / With the local battalion of the cold IRA / I’d read of our heroes and wanted the same / To play up my part in the Patriot Game. / They told me how Connolly was shot in the chair / his wounds from the battle all bleeding and bare / His fine body twisted and battered and lame / They soon made me part of the Patriot’s Game. // This Ireland of mine has been too long half free / Six counties are under John Bull’s monarchy / And still there are people who are greatly to blame / For shirking their part in the Patriot Game. // And now as I lie here my body all holes / I think of those traitors who bartered and sold / I’m sorry my rifle could not do the same / To those Quislings who sold out the Patriot Game.’ (Quoted and attributed in Rona M. Fields, A Society on the Run, A Psychology of Northern Ireland, Penguin Edn. 1973; see note, infra)

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Reference

Robert Hogan, Seven Irish Plays (Minnesota UP 1967), Introduction, cites Dominic Behan as having written “Mother Ireland, get off my back” (from Posterity Be Damned).

Doherty & Hickey, A Chronology of Irish History Since 1500 (Dublin: Gill & Macmillan 1989), tells that “The Patriot Game” is said to be about Sean South.

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Notes
Patriot games? Behan’s ballad “Patriot Game” is sometimes described as a ‘cautionary’ account given by a young IRA-man, dying of wounds, of his youthful nationalist enthusiasm and the callow expenditure of his life for ‘mother Ireland.’ (Rona M. Fields, A Society on the Run, A Psychology of Northern Ireland, Penguin Edn. 1973). It but is not always so received. The question arises whether Behan’s version is the original or a modification with different and more pacific intention pointing out the the folly of militant republicanism or simply a naive effusion heaping blame on the Irish politicians mentioned by Dervla Murphy [ as infra].

Dervla Murphy (A Place Apart, 1978), quotes two stanza of “The Patriot Game” in variant form (cf. supra), as follows: ‘My name is O’Hanlon and I’ve just gone sixteen / My home is in Monaghan, there I was weaned / I learned all my life, cruel England to blame / And so I’m a part of the Patriot Game. // I don’t mind a bit if I shoot down police / They are lackeys of war, never guardians of peace. / But at deserters I’ll never let aim / The rebels who sold out the Patriot Game.’ Murphy calls the ballad and its kind ‘excrable’ and assocaiates it with the death of two IRA volunteers in the raid on Brookeborough Police Barracks of 1957, and remarks: ‘One is immediately struck by the unwitting accuracy of that phrase “the Patriot Game”. By now militant republicanism has become just that [...]’, adding that the rebels in the final line are ‘Southern politicians who accepted partition.’ (p.176.)

Brian Brennan: The Patriot Game was the subject of a law-suit between Dominic Behan and Bob Dylan when the latter sang: ‘My name it means nothing. My age it means less ...’ - apparently supposing it to be a traditional Irish ballad, though actually echoing Behan’s line: ‘My name is O’Hanlon, my age is sixteen ...’ [as above]. In conversation with Brian Brennan, Dylan said: ‘Which, I wonder, speaks more loudly about the nihilism of nationalistic self sacrifice?’ Behan was awarded £300 in the legal action arising from the supposed plagarism which Brennan attributes to the influence of The Clancy Brothers. (Paraphrase of remarks posted on FB, 15.05.2019.)

Brid Boland quotes the Wikipedia entry on the song: ‘Like Behan, Bob Dylan used the melody of “The Merry Month of May” for his own song “With God on Our Side”.[1] Behan criticized Dylan publicly by claiming the melody as an original composition. He was annoyed because the first two verses of Dylan’s song were a parody of his own song. Behan took the view that the provenance of Dylan’s entire body of work must be questioned. Mike Evans writes that “legend has it” that, during an early tour of the UK by Bob Dylan, Behan rang him at his hotel room with an uncompromising tirade. When Bob Dylan suggested that “My lawyers can speak with your lawyers”, Behan replied, “I’ve got two lawyers, and they’re on the end of my wrists.”’ (Cited on FB, 15.05.2019.) Note: Google listing cites The “Patriot Game“ as a ‘song by the Clancy Brothers’ while Originalboland supplies a Youtube video of The Dubliners performing it. (16.05.2019.)

Wikipedia

The song concerns an incident during the Border Campaign launched by the Irish Republican Army during the 1950s. It was written by Dominic Behan, younger brother of playwright Brendan Behan, to the tune of an earlier folksong, “The Merry Month of May” (recorded by Jo Stafford and Burl Ives as “The Nightingale”). It tells the story of Fergal O’Hanlon, an IRA Volunteer from Ballybay, County Monaghan who was killed at the age of 20 in an attack on Brookeborough Royal Ulster Constabulary barracks in County Fermanagh on 1 January 1957. The operation was devised and led by Sean Garland, an IRA man from Dublin. Another volunteer, Seán South from Limerick, was also killed during the raid.

Behan later became close friends with Sean Garland, officiating as the best man at Garland’s wedding. Behan had been involved with the IRA before writing the song but he did not support the continuing violent campaign of the IRA at the time, and altered the first verse from his initial lyrics to distance himself from nationalism.

The song is one of the best known to emerge from the Irish nationalist struggle and has been popular amongst the IRA, although it has also been covered by artists from different traditions such as Harvey Andrews, and Christy Moore said that British soldiers often requested the song at his gigs.[4] “The Patriot Game” has been recorded by numerous artists, including the Kingston Trio, The Bluebells, The Dubliners, The Wolfe Tones, Schooner Fare, and The Clancy Brothers. It also appears on the Judy Collins LP record Whales and Nightingales.

There are variations on the lyrics, some of which date from Behan’s different versions. For example, the last line can be sung as either “... cowards who sold out the patriot game” or “... Quislings who sold out the patriot game”.

The cover by the Bluebells altered many of the lyrics to criticise “the old men who pay for the patriot game”, implying that young volunteers are manipulated into dying for a cause that they believe to be just. [...]
The entry also covers ‘Controversies’ including the encounter between Behan and Bob Dylan and Behan’s compaint to the Clancy Brothers at their omission of two stanzas which sanction the ‘murders of [Northern] Irish police officers’: ‘This Ireland of mine has for long been half free ... The rebels who sold out the patriot game.’
The following works quoting or otherwise influences by the song are cited: A documentary of 1979 directed by Arthur MacCraig treating Irish history in a Republican perspective; title of a 1986 thriller by Canadian writer Peter Brimelow, dealing with a Canadian context; Tom Clancy’s 1987 novel Patriot Games and the 1992 film based on it; Martin McDonagh’s play The Lieutenant of Inishmorewhere it is used to comment on the character’s misunderstanding of IRA splinter groups; a reference in “Colony”, a song by Damien Dempsey; and the British band Dire Straits ‘Brothers in Arms’ which strong echoes it in stanzaic form and subject matter. [Paraphrase by BS.]

Note: Behan’s performance of his own song recorded as “Easter 1916 and After” (RTE) is available at YouTube - online; accessed 16.05.2019.
“The Patriot Game” [entry], Wikipedia - online; accessed 16.05.2019.

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