|
Irish Emigrant
Book Review: Issue No.103 (Feb 2004)
Hope - Mary Ryan
Mary Ryan knows how to write a good story and she has certainly made the
most of her talent with this ready-made subject from her own family history.
Although the title would suggest that the main focus is on the famous
or infamous Hope Diamond, it is much more about the hopes for a fulfilled
life of father and daughter Thomas and Evalyn Walsh. Thomas Walsh left
his Co. Tipperary home in the mid-nineteenth century to seek his fortune
in America and, after years of dedication and hard work, ended up the
owner of a gold mine and one of the richest men in America. Grounded as
he was in his Irish roots, he was able to deal with the sudden access
of wealth, his only failing being the way in which he could deny his daughter
Evalyn nothing. Her story, as told by Mary Ryan with information gleaned
from Evalyn Walsh’s own autobiography, is one of a happy child living
in the wilds of Colorado who is transferred by family circumstances to
a life of indulgence in Washington, with every whim acceded to by her
doting father. The effect this had on Evalyn, her longing for the person
she had been in Colorado and her search for who she was led the young
woman to early experiments with alcohol, a dependence on morphine and
a less than considered marriage to the son of equally wealthy parents.
The narrative moves along at a brisk pace and we are given an insight
into the kind of extravagance possible for those with unlimited funds;
the purchase of a second car while touring Europe because the first didn’t
have room for all their luggage; the gift to Evalyn and Ned by their respective
fathers of $100,000 each for their honeymoon, and this was in 1908. However
as with so many prominent American families, tragedy is never too far
away. First Evalyn loses a much-loved brother and almost loses her own
life in a car accident and, once she has been persuaded by the Parisian
jeweler Cartier to buy the Hope Diamond, every reverse is blamed on the
misfortune associated with the gem. Evalyn, however, has always believed
that what is unlucky for most people is lucky for her and she continues
to wear it defiantly. Marriage and the birth of three sons sees her leading
something of a normal life for a while but when further tragedy strikes
the household, again associated with the diamond, Evalyn turns once again
to morphine and has to fight her addiction battle all over again. It is
sometimes difficult to remember that this is a true story, the story of
an Irish emigrant who rose to the top in his adopted country and a story
written by his great-grandniece. The twin elements of fact and fiction
have been smoothly fused, and though the reader is left wondering which
incidents are purely imaginary, the author solves the problem with a final
note outlining what is based on fact and what is entirely fiction. The
latter includes the character of Evalyn’s cousin Paul and the story of
a love that might have saved her from the more outrageous excesses of
her life. However what principally emerges from “Hope” is the saga of
two characters, Thomas and Evalyn Walsh, the one driven by ambition and
love for his family, the other by a relentless pursuit of pleasure, and
both forming the basis for an engrossing story well told.
[ top ]
The Captain with
the Whiskers - Benedict Kiely
This novel of a monstrous character who spreads his darkness throughout
his family and neighbourhood was first published more than forty years
ago but has lost none of the strength and menace in the intervening period.
Captain Conway Chesney, a military man who has seen service in the Boer
War, has browbeaten his three sons and two daughters and has reduced his
wife to a shadow. Upon this dysfunctional household stumbles Owen Rodgers,
son of a local musician, who becomes fascinated by the man who treats
him as an equal while reducing his own children to nervous wrecks. Where
the sudden death of their father should have liberated them, the influence
of the diminutive and highly-organised tyrant lingers on and affects each
in a unique way. In relating the gradual development of five individuals
and the interplay of their lives with that of Owen Rodgers, Benedict Kiely
has given equal importance to the backdrop of his own home territory and
the way in which the landscape and the seasons reflect the gloom and hysteria
of the captain’s children. Alfred, who almost escaped by way of a love
affair, becomes an inveterate womaniser of young girls and, in one of
the many humorous aspects of the novel, the author puts before us the
notion of Alfred “scattering the captain’s image broadcast throughout
the land so that monsters can spring up right and left”. Frank becomes
a priest and never rebels against the legacy of his father while Edmund,
the youngest son, is perhaps the most like his father in his drive and
ambition. Kiely is particularly insightful in the characterisation of
the two daughters, Maeve whose blossoming after her father’s death becomes
increasingly manic, and Greta, who ultimately loses all purpose in life.
Both girls engage Owen’s affections, one with adoration and the other
more with pity, but he ultimately learns that the love he believed in
was possibly a figment of his imagination. Benedict Kiely’s use of language
reflects the oral storytelling tradition of which he is master, and the
story of this novel is enjoyed almost incidentally and as a secondary
factor to the enjoyment of his powers of description and perception. The
turn of phrase moves the reader effortlessly along from character to character,
from scene to scene until one is subsumed into the Northern environment
and the lives portrayed. In an afterword, author and playwright Tom Kilroy
throws an interesting light on his reaction to the book when first read
forty years ago and his reaction to a second reading.
[ top ]
The House on Eccles
Road - Janet Kitchen
It is not entirely necessary to be familiar with James Joyce’s “Ulysses”
when reading Janet Kitchen’s affecting novel, but it does help to put
the narrative in context. The author details one day in the life of American
couple Molly and Leo Bluhm, residents of Dublin, Ohio, on their thirteenth
wedding anniversary, revealing a couple whose understanding of one another
and whose ability to read the other’s signals had been abruptly cut off
by the death of their son eight years previously. Molly’s day is punctuated
by her efforts to somehow mark the occasion of their anniversary, an occasion
which she knows in her heart has been forgotten by her husband, but she
never quite gives up hope. Through a series of missed notes and phone
calls Janet Kitchen conveys the deeper avoidances experienced by the couple,
who are both in their second marriages. Their story is intertwined with
those of an old lover, a young and promising student, a neighbour about
to give birth to her third child, and the whole is overlain with the inescapable
fact of Molly’s Irish and Leo’s Jewish background. What becomes apparent
through the narrative, which moves seamlessly from one character to another,
is that a lack of consciousness of the other’s needs and beliefs has developed
over the course of their marriage, and particularly since the death of
Arjay, their son. Incidents at both his birth and his death indicate the
divide between his parents, and it is only in the final monologue, reminiscent
of Joyce’s Molly but this time given to Leo, that we discover quite how
devastating an effect the four-year-old’s death has had on their marriage.
This is a book which immerses the reader in the daily round of a couple
struggling to rebuild lives shattered by tragedy, a tragedy which has
driven them apart into mutual misunderstanding; it seems that resolution
is impossible, and yet both seem somehow to be reaching towards an understanding
that will never be spoken and so will remain incapable of solving their
difficulties.
[ top ]
Ireland The Parting
Glass - Richard Fitzgerald
Details of his own life and the emigration history of his family were
among the prompts for this unusual collection of photographs taken over
a period of thirty years and presented to us as a chronicle of a 20th
century Ireland that has gone for ever. Richard Fitzgerald lost his mother
as a very young child and was reared by an aunt and uncle when his own
father emigrated. The author’s emigration at the age of fifteen, described
movingly in the introduction, is a fitting introduction to the scenes
he has chosen to depict. Old farmhouses, some ruined and some still occupied,
the creamery van collecting the churns, turf cutters and haymakers, and
musicians playing in rambling houses constitute his own memories of Ireland,
focused mainly on his native county of Waterford but following the south
and west coasts also. There is a mixture of colour and monochrome photography,
with some of the most haunting scenes using sepia or blue overtones. To
those who grew up or were acquainted with Ireland during the second half
of the twentieth century much will be familiar; to a younger generation
and those coming newly to the country the book might well instil a feeling
of regret, of having missed out on a richer time and place.
[ top ]
From Claire to
Here - Judi Curtin
In some regard this is a typical man meets woman, man rejects woman, reconciliation
story, but to Judi Curtin’s book there is a darker side involving both
date rape and a resolution to the ensuing pregnancy. Claire presents herself
as a less than houseproud mother of one little girl who is haunted by
a past experience in Greece and is unable to settle into a life of domesticity.
A chance win on a scratch card gives her the opportunity she needs to
retrace her steps and endeavour to deal with her demons. Not so happy
with her plan to take herself and four-year-old Lizzie to a Greek island
is her husband James, nor her less than sympathetic mother-in-law, Maisie,
but she heads off nonetheless. The central chapters of the book deal with
the events of a Greek summer spent with two college friends while all
were still students at University College Cork, and some of the details
of what caused the idyllic period to go horribly wrong. A little too much
emphasis is placed on Claire’s guilt - she has plenty to feel guilty about
without taking on the burden of her friend Jessie’s early death. Inevitably
on her return to Greece Claire meets up with a romantic interest in the
shape of Ross, and it is the difficulty she encounters in choosing between
Ross and James that takes up the latter and by far the most interesting
chapters. While her developing friendship with Maureen has a ring of authenticity
to it, Claire’s acceptance of blissful domesticity seems a bit too sudden.
However it does serve to point up the necessity for her to revisit her
past before she can contemplate her future. The revelations concerning
the years following her first Greek holiday are kept until the very end
which, while it helps to keep interest in the story alive, also serves
as somewhat of a distraction as I was expecting an explanation each time
the scenario changed. Judi Curtin’s sense of humour has saved “From Claire
to Here” from being just a little too obvious, and she has excelled in
the portrayal of the close relationship between Claire and her daughter
Lizzie.
[ top ]
Secret Sights
- Rob Vance
This is a book of atmospheric photographs of out of the way places in
Ireland, places that have a resonance for those seeking the Celtic and
pre-Celtic world away from the order of the interpretative centres. Writer
and photographer Rob Vance believes that the true Celtic presence can
better be felt in the less obvious sites which are sometimes hard to find
but which repay the persistence. Some of the most affecting illustrations
are of archaeological sites not immediately recognisable as such, the
Sligh Mhor in Co. Westmeath being an obvious example; a casual observer
of the grassed laneway near the village of Glasson in Co. Westmeath would
not immediately recognise it as part of an ancient chariot road. The book
is divided into provinces and counties, with details given of both sites
and artefacts relating to each area. “Secret Sights” has been published
as an accompaniment to an RTE television series of eight programmes but
stands in its own right as an insightful examination of the many reminders
of Ireland’s past.
[ top ]
Gather Round Me
- Ed. Christopher Cahill
New York based Christopher Cahill has selected a wide range of mostly
familiar Irish poems, from translations from early Irish poems to lyrics
by Shane McGowan of the Pogues. They are arranged to follow loosely the
course of a day beginning rather predictably with “The Dawning of the
Day” and closing with “The Parting Glass”. Percy French songs, poems of
lost love, of emigration and of love of native place are contained within
the pages, with humour from both North and South also finding a place.
English poets commenting on Ireland include John Betjeman’s “The Small
Towns of Ireland” and Richard Thompson’s “From Galway to Graceland”. Since
the collection is published in the US it was probably a wise move of the
editor to give an explanatory note at the end of the book for each of
the works selected, though they make for interesting reading on this side
of the Atlantic also; however unless Co. Mayo has experienced a radical
shift in location since I was last there I would dispute the author’s
assertion that it is, like County Tyrone, in Northern Ireland.
[ top ]
Marathon Marriage
- M.F. Kenny
Michael Kenny’s book about his parents, James and Ellen Kenny, is a ramble
through Ireland in the 20th century, a story centred on Banagher in Co.
Offaly but also encompassing Limerick, Tipperary, Cavan and Galway. James
and Ellen were married for an incredible seventy-two years and appeared
on Gay Byrne’s Late Late Show in the mid-1980s after having won the prize
of being the oldest couple with an account with the Bank of Ireland. It
is indicative of James Kenny’s patriarchal and dictatorial way that it
was only then that his family discovered that the pair had been married
in secret and lived apart for the first year of their married life. Kenny
has a conversational style of writing about his family, interspersed with
historical details which take him off at a tangent at various points in
the narrative. What comes over the most strongly, however, is the way
in which his father treated himself and his three brothers, giving them
neither responsibility nor salaries though all four were involved in the
various family businesses. James was an entrepreneur without the astuteness
necessary for business and often made wrong decisions, but would never
admit to them. Michael Kenny claims that the only person for whom James
had any feelings was his wife Ellen, for he barely tolerated his children.
The author describes how his father totally ruled the household, where
his word was law. Some of his actions are inexplicable; he refused medical
aid to his son Shem who had fallen from the top of scaffolding, and went
to the pub while the rest of his family attended the funeral of his grandchild.
For all his harshness, when his father died Michael reports that he “had
a good cry for a great father whose likes I will never see again”. This
is a story of one family, packed with detail and neatly fitted into the
context of both time and place which makes it a fascinating account. The
title I had assumed referred simply to the length of the marriage but
I believe that, despite the obvious love between the pair, it truly was
a marathon for James’ long-suffering wife Ellen.
[ top ]
Out of the Blue
- Eddie Stack
This second collection of short stories by Eddie Stack has a wonderful
sense of unreality, of weirdness among Irish characters and of downright
fun. Some are immensely visual; “Back in the Days of Corncrakes” is a
farcical tale of countrymen taking advantage of the media, while the final
story, “Out of the Blue” is an outstanding mixture of dark humour and
the realities of island life. The author has spread his net to cover both
sides of the Atlantic and two of the most affecting tales have the similar
theme of love separated by the ocean. “Flying Visit” has a contemporary
note, having as its hero the lead dancer in a travelling dance show, while
“Ellie” is perhaps the most satisfying of the stories, encompassing as
it does all of Stack’s talents for humour, poignancy and observation of
Irish life. The author has presented for our entertainment and contemplation
a range of Irish characters from a spiritualistic Jewish violinist to
an anthropomorphic ass.
[ top ]
Everyone’s got
a Bono Story - Anne Marie O’Connor
Anne Marie O’Connor takes a slightly skewed view of Dublin life and its
younger characters in a fast-paced novel which has Aoife trying to win
a bet by meeting up with Bono. The manic pace of the novel overlies a
slightly more serious theme of two young people trying to come to terms
with their parents. Aoife’s mother has travelled up from Kerry to keep
an eye on her, but her time in Dublin reveals a side to her that Aoife
has not seen before. Rory, her housemate, experiences a similar revelation
about his father, though in a much more negative way, but both are liberated
by their experiences to move on in their lives. Such seriousness, however,
is a relatively minor part of the narrative, the mad gallop through Dublin
in pursuit of Bono taking pride of place. On her journey Aoife encounters
a psychic, a boutique owner and a fellow waiter who all help her in her
quest. This is an entertaining first novel based on the author’s own experience
of living in Dublin for a short period.
[ top ]
|