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Executive Times |
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2008 Book Reviews |
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Tipperary
by Frank Delaney |
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Rating: |
*** |
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(Recommended) |
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Click
on title or picture to buy from amazon.com |
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Grand Frank
Delaney’s historical novel, Tipperary,
is a love story on many levels, set at the turn of the 20th
century. It’s the story of the love between individuals, the loving
restoration of a finely built castle, the love of freedom, and the love of
the land. By using alternating narrators, Delaney presents two perspectives
on the story: a contemporary speculation and a historic record written by
protagonist Charles O’Brien. All the major leaders and writers of the time
find a place somewhere in this narrative. Here’s an excerpt, pp.
30-33: In
today's terms, Mr. O'Brien's reaction may seem excessive. Not in Queen
Victoria's reign, when the idea of romantic love, descended from the times of
the troubadours, had well and truly taken root. In an era where prudishness
and repression were equated with prudence and responsibility, all that was
left to a man by way of expressing love was the report of his own passions. The
poets had led the way; "Byronic" had long been a shorthand term for
passionate emotion. Charles O'Brien, in common- with so many other men of the
day who fell suddenly in love, had solid precedent for seeing himself as a
dashing and romantic figure. Windswept and interesting, moody and wild with
love pangs, he was prepared to surrender all for love. But he was a little older than the typical
Byronic figure with the brooding lips and flowing white shirt. This was a man
who had already lived well more than half the male lifespan of the day. He
had claimed no prospects that he could offer a girl. And he seemed to depend
upon his paternal family and home far more than the typical man of his time. My first complete memory that is to say of a
cohesively remembered moment with its own Beginning, Middle, and End—comes
from my life at the age of almost four. I have other fragments from times
before then, the commonplace memories that I expect are found in all small
children: my father lifting me high while I looked down at his laughing,
exerted face; a curtain fluttering at an open window; a butterfly finding its
way. into the drawing-room and mistakenly alighting on a flower in the furniture's
fabric; the taste of sugar upon buttered bread, which Cally gave as a treat;
the tightness of a shirt-collar, worn to be gracious when Grandmother
Goldsmith or Aunt Hutchinson came visiting; the quiet hum of, deep, approving
conversation as my parents pored over my mother's ledgers. (Father was an
excellent and successful farmer.) That
very first memory, though, brought my introduction to fear and its thrill,
and it took place in the safest of surroundings. Our domestic bathing
arrangements never varied; Cally or Mrs. Ryan took responsibility for my
hygiene until the age of ten—when my father, with whispered asides to my
mother, consigned it to me alone. He supervised me, and in due course taught
me to shave: "Keep the razor wet!" One evening, early in 1864,
Mother came rushing to the kitchen, where I was often to be found among the
women (I was quite their pet), and she cried, "Bathing! We must bathe
Charles now!" Her urgency puzzled all until she explained in
whispers—and then Lally became urgent and raced me to the bathroom,
half-carrying me. Mrs. Ryan, who was as stout as a hippopotamus, huffed
along after us. Hot
water was brought upstairs, and I was washed as never before. So distressing
did I find this that Mrs. Ryan and Lally conspired to tell me. Mrs.
Ryan: "A girl's after dying in Limerick. You have to be scrubbed and
scrubbed." “Why?” Cally:
"She died of an awful thing." "What?" Mrs.
Ryan: "An awful thing altogether." "What's
an awful thing?" They
looked at each other and agreed with their eyes. Mrs.
Ryan: "She was a leper." I
thought they meant that the girl had somehow jumped off some great height and
died. "Why
do I have to be scrubbed because she leapt?" The
women began to laugh; Mrs. Ryan had her hands in the tub washing my feet, and
her great forearms all but heaved the water everywhere. When they subsided,
the women grew serious again. Cally:
"She had the leprosy." Mrs.
Ryan: "She caught it off a sailor's clothes that she was washing."
Gaily: "An African sailor, he was—he had it. A black fella." "What's
leprosy?" Cally:
"Your nose falls off." Mrs.
Ryan: "And your hands with it." Cally:
"They have to give you a bell to tell everyone you're coming and they're
to get out of the way—so's they don't catch it." "How
can you ring the bell if your hands have fallen off?" Mrs. Ryan:
"Well, you can." "Is
it a big bell?" Mrs.
Ryan: "No, no, a small little bell and you've to shout and warn
them." "What
do they shout?" Mrs.
Ryan: "I s'pose they say, `I have the leprosy, I'm a leper.'" Cally:
"No, they say, `Unclean, that's what I am, unclean.' " Such
a gift to a small boy! That night, to Mother's horror and Father's delight, I
took the serving bell from the dining-room table and went about the house
calling out, "Unclean! Unclean!" But it was true; a young
servant-girl had contracted leprosy in Limerick and died. Another
memory: three years later, early in 1867, our house became a place of secrets
and furtiveness. At night I would wake suddenly at the sound of hooves or a
cart or carriage rattling and jingling. Once or twice, I went halfway
downstairs and watched as big men with long beards came through the front
door, hauled off their greatcoats, and greeted my father. I heard much talk
of "ships" and "landing" and "rising"—which I
took to be the motion of the ship on the crests of the sea. Beyond
my imaginings, I achieved no knowledge of what lay behind or beneath these
visits, and my questions at breakfast next day accomplished nothing other
than deflection and a caution from my mother: "Charles, we don't like
people knowing our business." Even if I didn't understand the words,
she conveyed an unmistakable force of meaning. Years
later, I discovered the reason for this nocturnal activity, which lasted many
months. The Fenians, an international assembly of zealous republicans
dedicated to the independence of Ireland from England, had planned—and,
indeed, carried through an insurrection or uprising, hence
"rising." Much of it had been focused in our province of Munster
and, in due course, with Tipperary as a crucial member, the other five
Munster counties, Cork, Kerry, Clare, Limerick, and Waterford, intended to
flame with rebellion, which would then spread to the rest of the country. Unfortunately,
as has so often been the case in Ireland, two constant facts of Irish life
prevented the rebels from gaining wide ground: the weather and loose tongues.
On the night of the rising an unprecedented snowstorm hit the country. In
addition, everybody around us—the local priests, the local newspaper editor,
the local washerwomen and shopkeepers, the police and the army—knew all the
plans in advance. Wagging tongues saw to it that little blood would be shed
for Ireland that night. "All
cloak and no dagger," said my father when speaking of it to me years
later. "Too many saddles, too few horses." I
asked him what he meant. "They
were generally useless as rebels," he said. "Great company, though.
Great to argue with over a drink." Yet
History has credited them with "the Rebellion of 1867," even though
handfuls of men here and there, with old muskets and some pitchforks, were
merely rounded up by police, the more threatening ones lodged in the cells
for a few days and the rest sent home. The Cork Examiner newspaper
carried reports of numerous arrests, but the Fenians had, as yet, been mainly
drilling and marching, and had not fired a shot. Such was the level of Irish
uprising in the middle of the nineteenth century. Then, when I was ten years old, the
countryside resounded excitedly to a significant political development. Mr.
Gladstone, the Prime Minister, saw his government pass a Land Act for
Ireland that permitted tenant farmers some new rights. They now had to be
compensated for any improvements to their farms, and eviction could occur
only for nonpayment of rents. However, since the landlord could raise the
rent at a whim, the protection, when scrutinized, seemed infirm. My father's
pronouncement seemed to echo the country's response: "Well, it'll give
us something to talk about for a long while." Delaney
has a grand way of telling stories, and by using multiple narrators, he
multiples the ways in which he can weave together the complicated tale of Tipperary.
Some readers may be frustrated by the alternating voices, and the length of
the novel, but lovers of Ireland will be especially pleased with the ways in
which Delaney captures the people and the volatile era with such skill. Steve
Hopkins, February 21, 2008 |
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Go to Executive Times Archives |
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The recommendation rating for
this book appeared in the March 2008 issue of Executive Times URL for this review: http://www.hopkinsandcompany.com/Books/Tipperary.htm For Reprint Permission, Contact: Hopkins & Company, LLC • E-mail: books@hopkinsandcompany.com |
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