It’s that time of the year, again

 

I have begun to loath Saint Patrick’s Day.

I haven’t always. Back when I was a young lad growing up in Dublin, I loved it. You see, back then we were not encouraged to stand on street corners ogling the passing young girls. We even had a derogatory term for it; corner-boys, and no one from the respectable neighborhood I grew up in could openly aspire to becoming one of those. But it was allowed on St Patrick’s Day—in fact it was a mandatory cultural observation, of a sort.

You see, on Saint Patrick’s Day, Dublin was visited by marching bands from every corner of the United States of America—our undeclared colony—and I, along with all the other scuts, would go down to Grafton Street and watch all the beautiful young blonde majorettes showing off their long legs without a bit of shame.

Later, when I moved to Toronto, I threw myself into the celebrations that were more about declaring our presence in a city that had not welcomed us as it might. We drank our green beer and sang along with songs of sedition against old mother England who was still held dearly by most of Ontario.

In no time at all, I had joined a band and was up on stage inciting beery crowds to put aside all that winter had dumped on them and embrace a bit of craic. They were the best of times for folk musicians who, by the end of the night, could be rolling in the only green that matters, providing their bar tab didn’t devour it all.

For a number of years I even brought my kids to the parade, despite the cold and the lack of majorettes. But since then, I have grown very tired of it. It began when I still played with the band and got tired of drunken audiences who only wanted to hear; The Black Velvet Band, Whiskey In The Jar, and the worst of them all, The Unicorn. That and everyone who was not Irish getting drunk and talking like they do in Irish Spring commercials. How would you feel if, on your national day, the entire world dressed up and acted out every caricature of your lot—see what I mean?

Not that I am against people having a bit of fun. Nor do I resent bar owners having a good day though I am a little reticent about Diageo as cultural ambassadors. What bothers me is that being Irish is so much more.

I suppose that in these days of corporate intrusion into every corner of our lives it is too much to expect that the Irish would be celebrated for their real contributions to life. A millennium of resisting Imperialism made us keenly aware of social injustices—to ourselves and others. For centuries we exported revolutionaries to every corner of the world. We also sent out our compassionate to bring some solace to the downtrodden, and, our greatest exports; poets and dreamers but there is not much opportunity for profit in that.

It’s enough to drive ya to drink.

Born & Bred launch

BORN & BRED is the first novel in the Life & Times Trilogy, a cycle of three books that will chart the course of one star-crossed life. It is a work of vibrant imagination from a poetic novelist of the first order.

Danny Boyle was a born angel.

At least that’s what his granny used to say, and she should know – she raised him after his parents proved incapable. When she becomes ill, Danny is reunited with his parents but they do not get to live happily ever after, as the ghosts of the past haunt their days. And when the old woman dies, all of her secrets come to light and shatter everything Danny believes in.

In the turmoil of 1970’s Ireland, an alienated Danny gets into drugs and is involved in a gangland killing. Duped by the killers into leaving his prints on the gun, Danny needs all the help his friends and family can muster. Calling in favors from bishops and priests, police and paramilitaries, God and the devil, the living and the dead, they do all that they can. But even that might not be enough.

There’s always someone watching.

The whole business with Edward Snowden and surveillance did not come as a surprise to me. I have always assumed that someone, somewhere was watching.

No, I’m not paranoid. You see I was raised Irish and Catholic and, when I was a kid, my mother had eyes in the back of her head and could see across all four, if not five, dimensions. And she had the ability to read my thoughts—even before I thought them. “Don’t even think about it?” she’d warn and I’d stand there, stunned and struggling to blank my mind before I did anything to add to my guilt. 

As well as being my mother, she was also a teacher. In other words, she was the complete and perfect dictator, benign when it suited and draconian when the situation called for it. 

The outside world was no better, the women of the neighborhood were everywhere, watching, filing and disseminating all that went on back up the grapevine. Passing comments, too, to let you know that they were there and you were never beyond their range.

School was even worse, run by nuns who were trained and skilled in the dark arts of espionage. They could turn any lesson into a data gathering exercise. They could find out what we had for breakfast in several languages. The ‘How I spent my vacation,’ essays were nothing less than written statements full of incriminations about ourselves and our families. And, if any of us resisted or showed any reticence, there was always Confession.

Dark and confined, we would kneel and give up all that the data-gatherers had missed, fearful that the dark shape on the other side of the grill would reach out like the Spanish Inquisition and thumb-screw all sin from us. And afterwards, as an example to others, we had to kneel outside where the whole parish could see and say our penance while keeping an eye on everybody around you. Nobody wanted to be the last one—the one who got more than all the rest. It was like when the Pope used to make errant kings sit on the steps of St. Peter’s in sack cloth and ashes. 

And then there was God, the ultimate eye-in-the-sky. Nothing that you had done, did, or might do escaped him. He knew before you did and had probably already consigned you to Purgatory or Hell.

Not surprising that I became a rebel and moved my life into the underground but even there safety was not assured. Informers and spies were everywhere. Kids that you shared a cigarette with would give you up to save their own skin. Girls that you had tried to steal a kiss from would turn on you when you moved on to their friends, ratting you out to the nuns, who’d pass it on to the priest, who was sure to tell your mother while God looked on in dismay that was sure to become vengeful fury. It was no wonder that when I was old enough, I sought refuge in the only place where men could be themselves.  

Pubs. They were the last places where subversives could huddle and scoff at all the sheep who bleated that they were indeed free. We were the only truly free, even if only for as long as our money lasted. 

Poets, politicos, paramilitaries and folk-singers, we gathered in clusters and whispered about the revolution that was just around the corner. And it was in a pub that I met Joe who always smiled like a Yogi because he said it would drive the ever-present watchers mad wondering what he was up to.

So now, many years removed from all that was, I write what I think and feel so that there can be no mistake: I am, always was, and always will be me, like it or lump it.

And my advice to you: fear nought and dance like somebody is always watching. Twerk if you must and frolic like a pagan. You can blame it all on Social Media. Break wind loudly and often to startle eavesdroppers. You can always blame it on the dog because he knows: freedom is just a state of mind.

Reproduced from Part of the Story - the free quarterly for the The Story Plant

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The ‘real’ in the flickering light

Back in the hungry 50’s, one of my brothers and his red-headed friend would ‘borrow’ a donkey and stand on the side of the road, just outside of Killarney. Before long the coaches would arrive, full of Irish-American tourists. The lads would stand in their best ‘John Hinde’ poses, the coaches would stop and the tourists would pour out with cameras ready to capture this moment of pure Irishism! The redhead would stand with the donkey while my brother charmed for loose change. They always did very well.

By the 1970’s, I could be found among the hoard of shaggy musicians who were more than happy to hang around the pubs of Dublin with instruments ready. As soon as the tourists came in an impromptu music sessions would break out – as if by magic. Free drinks were the oil that kept the craic flowing and, with the right crowd, the session could last all night.

It was contrived to be sure, but then again it was the ‘tourist trade’ which is always a reflection of what people want to see. I doubt there were many tourists who wanted to see beyond the veil where poverty and despair haunted the lives of so many of us. 

Real Irish national identity has never been a simple thing to describe. Like all societies we have similar characteristics that can easily become stereo types but few of us actually wear green bowlers, carry shillelaghs and smoke cob pipes. Even less of us have actually seen leprechauns though, after a few drinks, many of us can tell you where you might find one!

Nor were we all the good pious Catholics the powers up in Maynooth tried to portray. Sure, we observed the bare minimum of required observance but at heart we were always pagans full of pishogueries—those rites and rituals to ward off the evil spirits. 

That all changed when the Celtic Tiger arrived. I wasn’t there for that, having fled to Canada on a whim, but for years I watched with pride as my wee nation rose from the economic quagmire. The young no longer had to scatter across the world as good work could be found at home. 

Before long I could see huge differences. Each time I went back I could sense a growth in confidence—the Irish were no longer putting on the poor mouth—(“an béal bocht a chur ort”) and were proudly stepping forward to claim their place as a shining example of economic miracle.

At the height of the Tiger, we became aficionados of French Cuisine and fine wines. We took holidays on the continent, skiing in the Alps in the winter and escaping the rain in Portugal where our fistfuls of freshly minted Euros could buy large amounts of everything. In time we lost sight of ourselves and, as is always the case, got lost. 

From the beginning, I feared that much that was of value might get lost along the way. Yes, I was glad to see us end our years of subservience but what about all of those things that made us distinct? 

Once the economic pain has subsided, and all the dust of recrimination has settled, a New Ireland will emerge—a wiser Ireland that will be more balanced. We have had centuries of good and bad and we know that each one comes and goes, regardless. We indulge in the good and learn to laugh at the bad—what else can we do? 

That is something that Ireland has rediscovered after a few decades of taking things far too seriously—the ability to laugh at the ways of the world. This is what Flann O’Brien was trying to tell us. Maybe now we can all go back to the wisdom of before, the poems of Austin Clarke and Paddy Kavanagh, the rapier wit of Oscar Wilde and the day-to-day sanguinity of Roddy Doyle because the world would be a much sadder place without the Irish for all their follies and foibles.

A ‘mad’ ramble about Mental Health

 

Thankfully issues around mental health are bubbling up across the popular discourse. It’s still a stigma for too many, but we are inching towards new understandings. I follow along with a keen interest because I, too, have suffered periods of terrible darkness. Many times in my life, I have hovered near the brink of the abyss—often enough to realise that, as I often heard growing up, “it could happen a bishop.”

In fact, I’m coming to the point where I become suspicious of anyone who does not suffer real depression from time to time. And no, I’m not being sarcastic, or cynical. We live in an awful mess of a place and most of the things we do just make it worse—like aspiring to be well-adjusted to the unmanageability we have created. And suppressing all efforts to be really honest about it.

You know, sometimes, no matter what marketing would have us believe, the glass is half-empty and, sometimes, we lack the where-with-all to replenish it. (In these times, I have always found it best to linger over the glass in the hope that something would show up before I reach the bottom. It always does, even if sometimes it is only the insistence that I buy another or leave. Other times, a friendly face would arrive and sit down beside me and buy me another.)

I speak, of course, about the days when I was a debauched alcoholic around the town—or, as I now like to call it, when my mental health issues were on steroids. And for the record, it’s been a very long time since my last drink, decades in fact, but the rest of it stays with me and affords me enough insight to relate. You see, drunks are among the most despised of the mentally/emotionally challenged and with very good cause. Drunken manifestations of all that is wrong inside are usually horrendous and often involve the terrorising of all who are close to the sufferer. Efforts to help are rarely rewarded with anything other than utter frustration. Drunks thrive on denial and become incomprehensible to those who don’t. I know all this because, as a child, I suffered the alcoholism of others and, as a young adult, still became all that I loathed. (Predestination: you’re a heartless old hag!) I used to feel a bit sorry for myself but that was just stacking fuel for future fires so I avoid that now.

But what has this to do with the Mental Health discussion? Well, I’ll tell you. Alcoholism is on the cutting edge of mental disorder in a number of ways. It’s where depression is jagged and quilt and remorse wait by the bedside every morning—or afternoon. It’s where paranoia becomes so real that you shake and shiver. It’s the awful essence of chronic disorder with bells and whistles that guarantees all kinds of unwanted attention. It’s like preforming a bad play naked on a very unforgiving stage.

But in so many ways, it’s not the worst of it. It has made its way into modern culture and the problem, and solutions, are now widely known and accepted. In fact one can now be admired for admitting to it, and dealing with it.

All fine and dandy unto itself, but what about the rest? What about all those people whose disorders are not so easy to diagnose. You know, all those people who get told to ‘snap out of it.’ People who cannot go along with all of the little white lies of existence and spend their lives staring into dark mirrors; people who sit beside you on subways and buses with their hearts bleeding; people we fear because we don’t want to catch whatever is bothering them. Depression is still seen as contagious, especially by those who run around trying to distract themselves.

And the solution? Well, beyond making the world a better place where everyone, regardless of colour, creed, and cult, can live freely and not be imposed upon by other people’s tyranny, I would suggest that we embrace disorder—or as we used to call it, madness.

All of the best people used to be mad and were considered ‘the best’ because they had learned to celebrate it. They learned to turn all that churned in side of them into gripping and provoking views of the real madness we are supposed to conform to. Writers, musicianers, and especially painters—and poets I suppose, if we have to be inclusive—have crafted ‘madness’ into some of the best expressions about life; far and away better than the spin of politicos and business-y types; far and away better than trying to conform to lies and distortions.

You see, I have come to believe that Art is a key to unlock so many doors. Good or bad (Art), it is the greatest outlet. Emotionally and spiritually fulfilling, (enough of the time), it lets us comment on the three-ringed circuses we live in. It has a proven track record in helping victims of trauma come to terms with unimaginable horror and it has allowed those who have fallen from the path, find their way to a better place.

It will not solve everything and for those who subsist in the shadows beyond my tongue-in-cheek generalisations, let’s get real about getting a little closer to a better understanding. Let’s do what we did with alcoholism and recognise it for what it is—a very common and costly problem that robs from us all. Let’s spend money, time, and energy trying to manage it a little better.

Let’s start making a little more room in the world for the wackos and winos, as we have done with all the other things that make us different. And for the love of live, let’s steer some resources towards those who have lost the struggle to cope with this mad, mad, mad, world.

And you know, if we tear down a few more curtains, and see how shabby we have made the world, we might start to fix it up a bit. Anything else would be insanity.

 

First appeared on The Story Plant Blog, for more please see:

http://thestoryplantblog.com/2013/11/15/peter-murphy-a-mad-ramble-about-mental-health/

The Novelist as the Advocatus Diaboli

 

In my humble and distorted view, there is one role that a novelist is best suited too; the role of Devil’s Advocate.

And for anyone who might be thinking Satanism, the Devil’s Advocate was the popular term for the Promoter of the Faith, Promotor Fidei, a Canon lawyer appointed by the Catholic Church to argue with God's Advocate, the Promoter of the Cause, Advocatus Dei, in the matter of canonizing saints.

Skepticism and the ability to poke holes in what passed for conventional wisdom were the key characteristics of a good Devil’s Advocate and, I believe, a good novelist. And in both cases, the more successful risked having their arguments confused with their real and private views.

In the case of writers, it’s understandable when you consider how many books are nothing more than thinly veiled prolongations of the writer’s agenda, be it political, cultural, social or religious.

In this, non-fiction often leads the way. Books that claim to be factual are often little more than the carefully selected arguments that support only one point of view. To my mind, that is an absurd way of looking at things and calls to mind the words of Jules H. Poincare: “To doubt everything or to believe everything are two equally convenient solutions; both dispense with the necessity of reflection.”

There is, was, and always will be, two sides to every story and even the devil himself must be afforded his say. As does the novelists who presents a view that is, at the same time, encouraging and despondent, insightful and vague . . . you get the picture.

And good novels will always leave their authors open to misinterpretation. Was Jane Austin really a misandrist? Was James Joyce anti-Semitic? Was Kafka just a bored bureaucrat? Does any of it really matter? These are points for the Devil’s Advocate in all of us.

What does matter is that throughout the history of novels, and indeed story-telling itself, the writer/teller can present an ‘argument’ that sets conventional wisdom on its proverbial ass. That so many of these ‘tellings’ have been banned, burned, shunned and derided is but the testament to their effect.

Most people that read novels have had that moment when a book spoke to them so loudly and clearly that it changed their lives. For me, there were a few but then again I am a bit of a gypsy at heart—with a pagan soul.

One novel that stands among the greats for me, was 1984 which I first read at the outset of adolescence. It confirmed everything I was beginning to feel about the world around me and now, 40 years later, has been proven. (And those of you who still accept the idea that it was Orwell’s rejection of Socialism should read it again.) It was, as a recent wag noted: “A warning—not a handbook.”

Shortly after that I read Demian, by Hesse, and life was never the same, but then again it never was and, if I am to understand what novelists suggest, never should be. And while these moments of epiphany are never forgotten, there are often too harsh and too painful to relive, over and over.

For this we have writings like: The Ingenious Gentleman Don Quixote of La Mancha by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra; a wonderfully simple tale of tilting with all that destroyed Andalusia. Read it again and marvel at how different it is from what you remembered. And take a moment to peep behind the veils that confuse poor Quijano but not Panza, bearing in mind the words of Edith Grossman who was tasked with translating it:

"The question is that Quixote has multiple interpretations... and how do I deal with that in my translation. I'm going to answer your question by avoiding it... so when I first started reading the Quixote I thought it was the most tragic book in the world, and I would read it and weep... As I grew older...my skin grew thicker... and so when I was working on the translation I was actually sitting at my computer and laughing out loud. This is done... as Cervantes did it... by never letting the reader rest. You are never certain that you truly got it. Because as soon as you think you understand something, Cervantes introduces something that contradicts your premise."

And after you’ve reread it, pick any good book you read many years ago and look at how far you have come since. (And, if you haven’t come as far as you wished—then simply read more books.) Look at all the writer alludes to in the spaces between the words and see how much you have been able to fill in on your own.

While you’re at it, take a chance on something new and different, too, so your mind does not become one of those dusty old places where the voice of the Devil’s Advocate can no longer be heard.

First appeared on The Story Plant Blog:

http://thestoryplantblog.com/2013/11/06/peter-murphy-the-novelist-as-the-advocatus-diaboli/