Thomas Flanagan's The Year of the French

I remember watching, as a very young lad, the 1982 RTÉ-Channel 4-France3 co-production The Year of the French, an adaptation of Thomas Flanagan's novel about the 1798 Rebellion (or Revolution, as it has come to be erroneously known). It is striking how vividly I remember the mini-series, which I watched compulsively every Sunday night and despite not having seen it since I can still recall the title sequence where a sleán digs brutally into the ground in extreme close-up. Likewise I remember the scenes at the end where the rebels are hanged for their acts, especially the face of the Romantic hero, the rakish Gaelic poet-hedgeschool-master Eoghan Ruath MacCarthaigh. I had suspected that my admiration for the show might have been a bit misplaced because of how young I was at the time but a few people a good deal older than me have confirmed my memories of it. Which makes one wonder why it has never been screened since - to the best of my knowledge it did not even get an airing during the bicentenary commemorations nine years ago - or released on video or DVD.

Flanagan's novel stood on the shelf at home for years when I was growing up, not too far from Colleen McCullough's The Thorn Birds, another doorstopping bestseller that was adapted for TV at the time. Because of this I imagined for a long time that Flanagan's novel was a Leon Uris-style potboiler, a novel that peddled comfortable truths about the glorious failure that was the rebellion and the foundation of modern Irish Republicanism. Last year I came across a re-issue of the book, published by the New York Review of Books, a publication that usually knows a good thing when it sees it. Flanagan, a third-generation Irish-American from Connecticut, and a childhood friend of Truman Capote, was a pre-eminent scholar of Irish literature - particularly the nineteenth-century, pre-Celtic Twilight variety, and published often in the NYRB, which has also re-issued his collected essays. He was one of those Americans (of whom there have been quite a few) that knew Ireland and its history better than many natives of the island, and he brought his extensive reading of 18th and 19th century writing to bear on the stylistic and political tour-de-force that was this, his first, novel.

The 1798 rebellion, like much of Irish history, is enveloped in the mists of collective memory and is usually evoked as an event far more cogent and straightforwardly noble than it actually was. From a modern perspective, it seems like an easy choice to make between the two principles: an avowedly non-sectarian Republican movement founded on Enlightenment ideals versus a foetid, decrepit oligarchy given free rein to rule at whim by a reactionary crown in London. Many of us - myself included - would naturally choose the former party though in doing so one runs the risk of extricating the event from its historical context. Flanagan's great achievement is to flesh out that contemporary world of the rebellion and to people it with characters with credible (if sometimes venal) concerns and motives. His narrative is a masterpiece of dialectical story-telling; though his sympathies are clearly with the rebels, there are few outright villains to be found on the side of either the loyalists (many of them Catholic) or the British. Flanagan is a believer of Jean Renoir's adage that 'every villain has his reasons'.

The novel makes use of a polyphonic narrative, much like a 19th-century novel, using multiple narrators, some in the first and some in the third person. The main character is the poet-schoolmaster MacCarthaigh, emblematic of the old Gaelic world that is about to die out, no matter how the Rebellion might fare. He wavers between idealism and cynicism, trusting neither the United Irishman leading the rebellion nor the French prosecuting the military expedition, reserving his chief concern for the wretched Irish peasants, his own people. There is also the narrative of Malcolm Elliott, a Mayo solicitor and landowner and United Irishman, who leads the insurgency in Mayo (the scene of the French landings and the start of the latter part of the rebellion); that of Arthur Broome, the humane Protestant minister of Killala; some exhilarating passages involving Wolfe Tone in Revolutionary Paris cajoling the Directory and Bonaparte into sending troops to help the Irish, and other narratives from the British perspective, many of them laced with a mixture of paternal condescension for and disbelieving resignation at the status and behaviour of the Irish peasantry and their aristocratic overlords. There is much in their narrative that many Irish nationalists will recoil at and denounce (quite rightly) as racism but Flanagan never allows his convictions to cloud his cool command of the narrative.

Flanagan's style (or styles, as they change as the narrators do) is elegant but never ostentatious and he has a meticulous eye for detail - both social and historical - that is indispensible in the historical novel. The build-up to the Rebel's ultimate routing at Ballinamuck is masterfully rendered as is the chilling retribution meted out to the Irish peasants by the British afterwards (30,000 summarily executed) which, as Seámus Deane, in the introduction, points out, made the French Revolutionary Terror seem a cake-walk in comparison. But the novel is also thick with the air of tension between the peasantry and the Protestant Irish, bearing in mind that the rebellion spiralled out of control in places, such as Vinegar Hill in Wexford, where the local Protestants were massacred in a horrific sectarian attack. Given the animosity harboured by each for one another, it is remarkable how the rebellion, and later Irish history, avoided a level of savagery that marked many other ethnic disputes throughout 19th- and 20th-century Europe. Often the remarks of the Protestant gentry and their English backers regarding the Irish carry the echo of the pronouncements of many contemporary Israelis about the Palestinian people; there is a willingness to be generous tempered by both a deep mistrust and a failure of introspection.

The rebellion of course failed, having been badly-organised from the start (though the failure of Hoche's 15,000 men to land at Bantry two years earlier was a crucial setback) and its leaders executed, leading to the abolition of the Irish Parliament and the Act of Union, and a century that was as tragic for the Irish as the previous one, though one which ended on a hopeful note, following the Land Wars and the Irish Cultural Renaissance. It is hard to guess how different things might have been had the United Irishmen succeeded in imposing their Revolution. After the fall of Bonaparte at Waterloo, the British would probably have moved back in, for the industrial jewel of Belfast, if for nothing else. Ireland may have become more economically-self-sufficient sooner though it is unlikely that the peasantry would have fared much better and the Irish language certainly would not have survived the United men's 'civilising' drive any more than it did the one that the British later implemented. The ideals of the United Irishmen were admirable though this is no guarantee that they would have informed the state of Ireland that followed; both the 1916 proclamation and the (original, unamended) Irish Constitution were admirable progressive documents that failed to have much effect on the society that followed them. But 1798 was nonetheless crucial in sowing the seeds of Republicanism in Ireland without which modern Ireland would undoubtedly not exist. That a group of men in a small, underdeveloped country in Europe at the time could be so audacious and far-sighted to follow the examples of the US and France and attempt to force change was a remarkable thing.

The streets in the towns of Mayo and Sligo - where much of the rebellion took place, bear the names these days of Wolfe Tone, Teeling - the Belfastman who was a General in the French Revolutionary Army - and Humbert, the French General who led the expedition and whose name has been hardened into English - as it would later be in Nabokov's Lolita - in towns such as Tubbercurry. Flanagan's novel is one of the greatest of all Irish novels of the 20th century - it is, to all intents and purposes an Irish novels - and deserves a new, wider audience.

More Fillums from Cannes

Every year at Cannes there are films that divide - sometimes they are winners of the Palme d'Or, such as Lars Von Trier's Dancer in the Dark, Tarantino's Pulp Fiction and Michael Moore's Fahrenheit 911 (though the objections to Moore's Palme d'Or were mainly political). This year such films appear to be Andrei Zviagintsev's The Banishment, for which Konstantin Lavronenko won the Best Actor prize and Carlos Reygadas' Silent Light, which shared the Jury Prize. Zviagintsev's previous film, The Return, won the Golden Lion at Venice in 2003 and was a superb, tightly-marshalled tale of the mysterious return after years away of a brooding, sadistic father and its effects on his two sons. The Banishment, however resulted in huge walk-outs among critics; such a divisive film can only be worth seeing. Reygadas' last two films Japón and Batalla en el cielo similarly provoked mixed reactions, not least because of their graphic sex scenes and the extreme violence of the latter. I liked both films, with some reservations, and his latest, a slow, difficult examination of Mennonite farmers in Northern Mexico, looks like it might appeal to me too.

Many critics have spoken of the general quality of films being higher than usual, and one would expect it to be better than last year, which returned very few memorable movies. Gus Van Sant received a special prize for his latest film Paranoid Park and the Grand Prix - the runner-up prize that has been scornfully received over the years by many people such as Krysztof Kieslowski, Von Trier and Michael Haneke - went to Japanese director Naomi Kawase, whose films have been enjoying critical acclaim in France for a number of years but is largely unknown in the English-speaking world. There was also a warm welcome for Garage, the latest collaboration between Lenny Abrahamson and Mark O'Halloran, following the wonderful Adam & Paul. A bleak tale set in the West of Ireland, it stars Pat Short in an unusually straight role, for which he has got good reviews. Short's latest show Killinascully is hugely successful but, from what I hear, dire stuff but it is worth remembering the glory days of d'Unbelievables and his and John Kenny's turns in Father Ted. It is top-class culchie humour, a note-perfect portrayal of the language and mannerisms of small-town Ireland. Like much of the best Irish comedy, it probably wouldn't travel very well. But enjoy it all the same. 'You might as well make tay for them'. Classic.

The Times They Ain't a'Changin'

No in-depth analysis of the election results here, I will leave that to others and, in any case, the outcome has left me a bit too weary to do so. In years gone by I would probably have spat fire and declared myself to be disgusted at Fianna Fáil edging closer to an overall majority and Fine Gael approaching fifty seats at the expense of smaller, left-wing parties but I am rather sanguine about the choice made by the Irish people to maintain the status quo (or, perhaps more accurately, to return us to the status quo of an earlier age). The economy, so far, is still buoyant and there is no sense of panic among the electorate; that much was known before the election. As for Fianna Fáil and Bertie Ahern being punished for their blatant corruption, that was never going to happen at the ballot box, as it has never been something that has exercised the concerns of Irish voters too much. I remember my uncle at the time of the 1989 election, complaining that it 'said a lot about this country that blackguards like Seán Doherty and John Ellis coast to re-election while decent people like Ted Nealon struggle to get returned'. Ireland is far from being the only country in the galaxy where that is the case however - one need only look at the selection of convicted crook Alain Juppé in Nicolas Sarkozy's cabinet for proof of this. There may come a time when the flagrant abuse of public office by Irish politicians will be effectively tried in court but it will never happen on election day.

The real opportunity missed is for a more civic-minded governance that might have eventually got the country's infrastructural shambles sorted out, the health service upgraded to something resembling that of a civilised country, and faced down powerful interest groups such as the publicans, the builders and the auctioneers. But we all know what party takes care of them. Socially-progressive legislation from Fianna Fáil is most likely going to take the form of the (admittedly admirable) tax on plastic bags. They might even surprise us and fob us off with gay marriages and stronger civil unions for all, but it won't go much beyond that.

Though I've never voted either Fianna Fáil or Fine Gael in my life, I grew up in a place where people seldom voted anything but either, and Ballymote returned for the first time in history two TDs - one Fine Gael, the sitting TD John Perry (himself a disgruntled renegade from FF a long time ago) and the other, the former Senator Eamonn Scanlon, of Fianna Fáil. I know both men (or certainly knew them better when I was growing up) and I am not so bolshy that I can't wish them both well. In a clientelist system like Ireland's, ideals, or even ideology, count for very little, and I am man enough to accept that, as I am to accept that the depressing prospect of a Fianna Fáil-Labour coalition (five years of which will only damage Labour) is very much alive.

Ideology (or a naïve belief in it) did for the Progressive Democrats, who have experienced a sore encounter with the face-cloth of history. The party's appeal has shrivelled to less than 3% of voters, and their relevance is now in question - after all, who needs a free-marketeer fringe party in a booming economy where nobody calls into question the primacy of the market? To the best of my knowledge Michael McDowell has become the first party leader (or major party leader, at least) in history to lose his seat (Dick Spring came very close back in 1987). I am not claiming any unique insight here as it was a view held by many but this is how I assessed McDowell's election as PD leader last September. McDowell's retirement from public life is one of the few cheering things about this election but it is really only a battle won in an otherwise devastating war. Sad to see Joe Higgins, the Kerry Marxist who was hand-over-fist the most brilliant debater in the Dáil, lose his seat; as Donagh of Dublin Opinion says, Leinster House will be a duller place without Higgins and the keen sarcasm of the Ranelagh Rottweiller.

The Equal of Ecuador

A bit on football: the Champions' League final was a disappointment though I imagine that the majority of finals in this competition have been such - they certainly were when I was growing up. Fillipo Inzaghi's first goal was dubious in my view, as it clearly went in off his arm, which when moving propelled the ball in the direction it took. It may not have been intentional but an advantage was gained. The Herald Tribune's news report claimed that the ball struck Inzaghi 'above the left-ear', which reminds me of the apartheid-era police claiming that deaths in custody were due to the prisoner throwing himself out of a window. That Liverpool did not protest much says a lot about their professionalism, even if they failed to produce much that could trouble Milan. A much greater injustice was caused by the organisers' incompetence, which caused Liverpool fans without tickets to be denies entry while some with forgeries got in; UEFA's response was to blame Liverpool fans 'collectively' for the incident. It's the sort of disingenuous idiocy that we have all come to expect from football administrative bodies.

Meanwhile over in a near-empty Giants Stadium in New Jersey, a bunch of callow youths in green shirts (and Kevin Kilbane) drew 1-1 with Ecuador, a supposedly spectacular diving header from Kevin Doyle securing the draw. Stan sent out eleven lads on international duty for the first time, including Joe Gamble of Cork City and Joe Lapira, the American-born star of Notre Dame 'Men's Soccer Team'. Lapira is the son of a Dublin mother and is the first amateur player to play for Ireland since 1964. His uncle works at the FAI, and everyone knows that it pays to be be cosy with Merrion Square if you want to wear the green. There were no fewer than four Corkonians used, as well as a few more that have passed through Turner's Cross; Liam Miller was also recalled for the tour, so Roy's gripe about the blazers' beef with Leesiders is looking increasingly strange. A good result but with the Duffer out for the rest of the campaign things are not going to be easy.

Celtic, having stumbled to their second title in a row, face Dunfermline in the Scottish Cup final tomorrow and I have to say that I will not be too tearful if the relegated Pars upset the odds to win their first Cup in forty years. A bit unnatural to wish your own team ill but Dunfermline deserve something after an excellent run, which has seen them eliminate Rangers, Hearts and Hibs. Stephen Kenny's first season in charge disappointingly failed in that they went down but he has fulfilled the potential he showed at Derry. Whichever side wins I'll be happy. Celtic need to recover some of their hunger before next season.

PR Success

The joys of Proportional Representation; one of the great things about the Irish electoral system is PR. I could say this is so because of the lofty principle of comprehensive democratic representation being guaranteed, with smaller parties having the chance of parliamentary participation, providing a check on political monopolies (though it must be pointed out that Ireland does not suffer from the far-right whose political successes led to the end of PR in France). But the real reason for liking PR is because it livens up the election, stretching it out for a couple of days (unlike in France and Britain where the results are known almost as soon as the polling booths close), and sometimes weeks, as in the titanic struggle between John Gormley and Michael McDowell in 1997, one of the few cheerful results in that election. To spice up an election where a right-wing-dominated government is always guaranteed is no small mercy. And then there are all those labyrinthine statistical permutations that tell their own tales, many tales in fact. Sad, I know, but politics is not interesting per se is it?

About Tomorrow

A heavy workload today and the Champions' League final will probably prevent me doing a last post on tomorrow's election, so I will simply say that I am hoping for a change of government. No real surprise there - if I were able to vote, it would be going, as it did last time, to my fellow Sligo-man Joe Costello of Labour, running in Dublin Central, with transfers going to the Greens and left-wing independents. As you can see, I don't view Irish politics along the old Civil War divide (though neither, really, do the two right-wing parties that that divide produced).

A feature of this election campaign has been the absence of any substantial economic policies being floated, probably because nobody sees it wise to tamper with the feelgood factor that the prosperous years has produced. It's not the economy, stupid. But there is much discontent in the country also, on the insane price of housing, about the fourth-rate healthcare system, serious flaws in education (ones that have failed to be ameliorated since long before we became rich) and, the pathetically low quality of life available to most people in such a well-off country. One might also add the perennial stench of corruption, most of it emanating from the Soldiers of Destiny, but it appears the Plain People of Ireland are not overly concerned with that. It's a smell they can live with.

The last opinion polls I saw suggested that the two possible coalitions are neck-and-neck, though the Greens were not factored into a Rainbow one. So there is a good chance that there will be a change of government. Ideally it would be a wholesale change but I am sure that Labour, just as in 1992, will ditch their pre-election stance and enter coalition with Fianna Fáil, if need be. It would be hard to stomach but one can at least hope they will put manners on the bastards. The two coalition governments Labour were involved in in the 1990s produced enlightened social legislation that dragged Ireland kicking and screaming into the 20th century. Kicking and screaming indeed as they suffered huge losses at the 1997 election, accused of being arrogant. Electorates anywhere in the world are rarely rational, and Ireland is no different. The most cheering possibility is the likelihood that the lunatic fringe of the PDs will be consigned to history - never before has a party of 2% support held such a disproportionate influence in government. Michael McDowell has been led a merry dance by Ahern and Co. since he assumed the leadership last year, proving himself to be as inept a political dealer as he is a shameless opportunist. After the election he may have very few comrades to provide him with doughnuting services in the new Dáil.

Non-Stop Stopping at Shannon

A Dublin friend of mine, who is also a former resident of Paris, was over here for the weekend; he has been a tireless campaigner (along with many others) against US Military flights into Shannon for the past four years and he is currently engaged on a quixotic task to get electoral candidates to commit to a resolution that will ultimately apply the law of the land and put an end to the illegal stopovers. There have been a few takers, such as Michael D. Higgins, who has drafted his own statement on the matter, while Ciarán Cuffe weighed in with the wryly-worded 'we hope to be opposed to the stopovers'. The flights are clearly not an election issue - and there is no real reason (other than a moral one) why they should be as elections in any country are rarely fought on matters of foreign policy. I have tried explaining this to American expats living in Paris over the scant reference to such a thing in the French Presidential campaign.

More worrying however is the likelihood that the issue of the Shannon stopovers will be sidelined in an eventual coalition government, which is more than likely going to involve Labour, and possibly the Greens too. I cannot see Labour - no matter how strongly individual TDs feel about the Shannon stopovers - exhausting their policy trump card on a matter that the majority of Irish people have but a passing interest in. I would like to believe otherwise but this is the way it is probably going to be, and I can't say either that I would entirely blame Labour for such a stance. Instead I imagine that the world will watch as the Americans pull out of Iraq and in the wake of the Septics' reintegration into the less clamorous world, the issue of the Shannon stopovers will be quietly put to rest. That's politics for you, to paraphrase a former Taoiseach.

A Week Off

Back after six days away, and it was a pleasant break to get away from both the blog and the Web in general for a while. Seville is a beautiful, pleasant city though competing commitments prevented me from seeing as much of it as I would have liked. I expect to be going back again soon enough though. In my absence the Premiership (or, the Premier League, as it was rebaptised at the weekend) finished; Ireland finished last in the Eurovision, proving that John Waters' talents are not limitless; Sligo Rovers hammered Cork City 4-1, a team they have failed to beat for a great many years and a Fianna Fáil councillor has blamed the arrogance of his party's ministers on a complacent opposition. Irish politicians shy of pointing the finger? Plenty to write about...

Pioneers of the Total Absenteeism Association

Unlike many of his contemporaries back on the old sod, Seanachie has managed to bravely sustain the age-old Irish tradition of impecuniosity, and has thus missed out on the opportunity to become an absentee landlord, a position in society that has scarcely being so popular in Ireland as it is these days. It is therefore with some amusement that I witnessed the collapse of the Spanish property market last month, causing much grief among the Irish landlord class. A story in today's New York Times tells of the new wave of Irish investors attracted to New York by a weak dollar and the possibility of high rental returns. A dream for the Irish boy-come-good. The story ends on a dissenting note though, courtesy of Real Estate agent William Fegan (probably one of our own with a name like that) who said that

he feared that many Irish buyers were too focused on the potential rental income and not enough on all of the other costs of owning an apartment in New York.

“For the life of me I haven’t been able to figure it out,” Mr. Fegan said. “If I was to advise them, I’d probably tell them not to do it. Carrying an apartment in New York City is an expensive proposition.”

Irish people focussing only on a quick buck and not on long-term costs? Who would have thought it possible?

Sweeter Sixteen

Austria has become the first country to lower the voting age for all elections to 16. I don't see any reason why not, though I cannot imagine teenagers beating down the doors to vote for the first time. Still, a laudable measure and it seems that Ireland is the only country in the EU allergic to the concept of electoral reform.

Thou Shalt Not Travel

The old stalking horse of abortion rights in Ireland returns. News reports say that the Health Service Executive is refusing to allow a 17-year-old to leave the country in order to terminate her pregnancy - the child being unlikely to survive very long after birth. That is correct, they are refusing to let her leave the country. I was naive enough to believe that this particular issue at least was settled in one part of the three-pronged referendum of November 1992 but there are people that clearly think otherwise. Apparently the poor young woman is not sufficiently suicidal to be allowed travel for an abortion. Must try harder...

A Shell of Themselves

No time to post anything lengthy today due to a heavy workload but here's something I've just received from my friend Sinéad, her film for Al Jazeera about the Rossport-Shell protests. The episode showed both up once again the disgraceful behaviour of Shell in carving up oil and gas concessions the world over, the craven compliance of the Irish government and the phenomenal backbone and spirit of the Mayo locals in resisting the steamrolling over their community. Principles are something that have been thin on the ground in Celtic Tiger Ireland but this is a heartening example of the reawakening of the people. It would be nice to see Fianna Fail get a bloody nose in Mayo on the 24th of May but that might be expecting too much. Well done, Sinéad and kudos too to Al Jazeera for bringing this to an international public. It would be nice if there were a little more media focus on issues that the consensual Irish media would prefer to ignore.

Electoral Limbo

The General Election has been called, unsurprisingly for the 24th of May, making it five years almost to the day since the last one (for those non-Irish folk looking in, I am talking about the Emerald Isle here). Due to my brother's wedding twelve days beforehand I am not going to be able to take more time off work that month to return home and vote (which I did in 2002, though I had only been gone two months at that time). But I shouldn't have to return home. Depriving tens of thousands of other Irish people living abroad of a vote is a grave violation of democratic rights and is something that shocks foreign friends of mine when I inform them of it. There is no reason that votes cannot be submitted either by post or at Irish embassies and consulates abroad, as most other countries do, but facing an electorate that might have an inkling of how things are done elsewhere is not part of Fianna Fail's electoral engineering.

Insisting on having the elections on Thursday is another example of cute hoorness that obstructs the democratic process. Most European countries hold elections on Sundays for the most logical of reasons: most people are off work that day and it is easier to get to a polling station. Holding an election on a Thursday would be considered insane by most French people. Apparently the Rainbow Coalition are planning to abandon this crooked practice - hopefully they will. As I have said before I am unlikely to be living in Ireland under the next government but until I take out French citizenship or the laws governing elections here change I have no option but to jet back to Ireland come every election and falsely declare residency in order to cast my vote. I may have a touchingly old-fashioned belief in the power of one man, one vote but if it's a delusion, it's a comforting one. Will The Irish Times, so taken with the stirring example of democracy at work in the French Presidential elections, be writing an editorial deploring this scandalous lacuna in the democratic process closer to home?

Les Irish Times et ses conneries

There are few things in the world more pompous than the sounds of an Irish Times editorialist opining on France, and today's leader is a classic specimen. Because of the delusions of grandeur that persuade the Old Lady (late) of D'Olier St that anyone could be arsed paying €79 per year to access material, much of which can be found elsewhere for free on the Net, most of you will not be able to read it. But here is a taster of it from the first paragraph (the headline is 'A Triumph for French Democracy'):

French voters reaffirmed the basic right-left cleavage of their politics yesterday by deciding that Nicolas Sarkozy and Ségolène Royal will compete in the final round of the presidential election on May 6th. It was a magnificent demonstration of democracy in action, as 85 per cent of voters turned out compared to 60 per cent in the first round five years ago. They have opted in a politically coherent way for the two most serious candidates.

Democracy lives again, as long as it is returned to a two-party system. Do Madam Kennedy and her boys and girls not find something hollow in that affirmation of the 'triumph' of liberal democracy? A turnout of 85% is remarkable but people voted less out of any duty to the Republic and its high-flown notions of participatory democracy than out of fear and shame after what happened last time, and also to express either their revulsion at or admiration for a personality as poisonous as Nicolas Sarkozy. There has been much rot spoken about the rejection of 'extremes' in this election, which is a typical liberal lie; the extremes have not retreated at all but have been endorsed following their co-option into Sarkozy's rhetoric and program. To imagine that the French body politic has suddenly cleansed itself simply because Le Pen's vote dropped to a still depressingly high 11% - his votes moving to a more pragmatic version of his old self - and the centre-left garnered a high score from a terrified resorting to utilitarian ballotting, one has to be either a knave or a fool. And I think Ireland's 'Quality Daily' has it well within its capabilities to be both.

Chargers or Horses?

France's Le Nouvel Observateur is not too impressed by Yawn Banville's Booker Prize-winning The Sea, just translated into French. Here's what they say:

'John Banville writes well - there's no doubt about that. He writes well, and that impresses, and wins awards... Stendhal could never understand why certain writers prefer 'charger' to 'horse'. Banville is no Stendhalian. He prefers 'charger' to 'horse'. What's more he judiciously saddles the charger with an adjective - it is a 'wild' charger - the better to spur the old nag on.

'Banville is Irish. You'd hardly think it, given the general speed of his compatriots' speech. A sort of urgency to tell all. A narrative euphoria that sends the writer off on a merry gallop. That said, one shouldn't weigh oneself down with superfluous words. With John Banville, there are too many words, an excess of rhetoric.'

And it finishes with:

'Ah! If only Banville were to give up his chargers to the benefit of horses, how great he might be!'

I have not yet read The Sea (and apologies to those that have for the translation into English of a review of a translation of the book, thereby occasioning some slippage in interpretation) but this review sums up quite well my views of all the books of Banville's that I have read. He writes well but his books are dull as hell. The French seem to have it right on this one.

Irish Pint Glasses 6% Smaller Than in 2001

New from the people that brought you Census 2006: the Central Statistics Office (and, of course, those plucky fellows at the Revenue Commissioners) report that alcohol consumption per adult has fallen in Ireland by 6% since 2001 (I was wondering why those heady party days of the turn of the Millenium have never been matched of late). Cynics might point out that those under the adult-drinking age may be offsetting this at the very least, but that's something for another survey, and anyway minors don't pay tax so the lads at Dublin Castle are fecked if they could be arsed. How long will it be before the shirts start being sold off the backs of the country's long-suffering publicans (or, ahem, 'vintners'), following this calamitous news?

Supermarket Sweep

Ballymote, Co. Sligo, where I had my first experiences of the ways of the world appears to be a hot ticket for powerful men scrambling for votes these days; last summer Mayor of New York Michael Bloomberg jetted in (and back out again rather quickly), and this week it was the turn of the State Wine Waiter-in-chief Mr Bertie Ahern, who was in town to open the newly-refurbished Kane's Supermarket (refurbished to the tune of €4 million, how times have changed in Ballymote). Bertie's intervention is doubly significant as the chief rival of Kane's is Perry's Spar Supermarket, owned by local Fine Gael deppity John Perry. I am not going to vote for either Perry or any of the specimens put forward by Fianna Fáil - nor am I going to be spending my pennies any time soon in either shop - but I am amused at this little piece of political theatre (or maybe 'vaudeville' would be a better word). Text-book Irish bad form. And there was me, wasting my time on Nicolas Sarkozy

A Greater Ireland

Ireland has just got bigger. According to reports from RTÉ and The Irish Times (registration required for the Times), Ireland has just been given the right by the UN to extend its continental shelf to beyond its current 200 miles, though we are not told by how much. Minerals in them there waters apparently. Next stop, Rockall...

Earley Bird Catches the Worm

My fellow Ballymote-man Lieutenant General Jim Sreenan's relatively brief tenure as Irish Defence Forces Chief of Staff has come to an end but the Connacht mafia remains in power in Óglaigh na hÉireann (official branch) with the appointment of former Roscommon GAA star Dermot Earley (or Major General Dermot Earley to you and me) as his replacement. Typical, the Irish army goes for the glamour candidate. I'm sure that Maj Gen Earley will be well up to the job though, but I wonder are there any other former sports stars in history that have had the opportunity to run an army? Answers on a post-card, please... I just hope that Dermot doesn't lose the run of himself and set out to exact revenge for the 1980 All-Ireland final.

Is Angela Merkel a Secret Blueshirt?

Speaking of April Fool's, surely this can be the only explanation for the story from the 'Irish' Examiner, telling us that German Chancellor Angela Merkel has concerned herself with Irish domestic politics and endorsed a vote for Fine Gael in the forthcoming election. C'mon, you're having us on, aren't you, lads?