by Ultan Macken
It’s clear from listening to the conversations between Mungo and his son and daughter that there is conflict between them. The two young people want to get out of the tenement and get a house in the country, in Shantalla or Rahoon, while Mungo is determined to stay in the tenement where generations of his family have lived. The doctor is called for one of the children, who probably has contracted TB from the unhealthy surroundings, and the doctor warns Mungo to move. Mungo’s wife never appears on stage, she just calls on him occasionally from downstairs. Another character is Winnie the Wild Duck and upstairs there are other tenants in the house, like Jack Manders and his wife.
Mungo’s best friend is Mowleogs – someone who looks like a tramp, but is a fixer. He feeds Mungo’s gambling habit by telling him he has information on a horse that is a cert to win a race that afternoon. Mungo reluctantly gives him the money and Mowleogs heads out. Mowleogs does not put the money on the horse and instead he buys Mungo a Hospital Sweepstake ticket (this was a bit like the Lotto – people bought a ticket and if their ticket drew a horse that subsequently won a race, they could win up to IR£250,000). Mungo’s ticket draws a horse in the Sweepstake draw. Then they have to borrow a radio and have it set up in Mungo’s room, so that they can hear the race. Mungo’s horse wins and the household rush out to tell the neighbours. During all this excitement, no one noticed Jack Manders and his wife slip out of the room and go up to their bedroom. Manders murders his wife and soon afterwards walks into Mungo’s room to talk about the murder.
While reading through contemporary copies of the Connacht Tribune in the 1930s, I came across a court case where a young man, a former member of the British army who had fought in the First World War was brought to court and convicted of murdering his wife in their home. That report would have been read by my father and could be the origin of his Jack Manders character, as the murder occurred in an area of Galway quite close to where my father lived.
My father finished the play in 1944 and submitted it to the Abbey Theatre. They accepted it and then my father wrote to the publisher Macmillan asking them would they consider it for publication:
2 Whitestrand House,
Grattan Road,
Salthill,
Galway.
12–10–’45
Dear Sir,
The Abbey Theatre Company, Dublin, are shortly to produce a play of mine, entitled ‘Mungo and the Mowleogs’. Would you be interested in reading a copy, with a view to publication?
Yours sincerely,
Bhaitear Ó Mhaicín
Macmillan wrote back straight away:
Bhaitear Ó Mhaicín Esq.
2 Whitestrand House.
16th October 1945
Dear Sir,
We write to thank you for your letter of October 12th and to say that if you will kindly forward to us the MS of your play, ‘Mungo and the Mowleogs’ we shall be pleased to give it our careful consideration.
We are,
Yours faithfully,
Macmillan & Co. Ltd.
My father sent them his manuscript on 18 October. Ernest Blythe in the Abbey Theatre asked him to change the title of the play so he called it Mungo’s Mansion. Six weeks after submitting the play to Macmillan, he had completed his first novel, which he had begun in November 1944, and he wrote to them again:
2 Whitestrand House.*
3–12–’45
Dear Sirs,
Some six weeks or so ago, I sent you a copy of a play, ‘Mungo and the Mowleogs’ for your consideration. This play will be receiving its premiere in the Abbey Theatre on January 7th next. In connection with this, I have altered the ending of the play and I am sending you a copy of the alteration. If you reject this play it won’t matter; if you accept it, it probably will. The name of the play has been altered to ‘Mungo’s Mansion’. Rather belatedly, I enclose a postal order to cover the cost of returning the manuscript, if found unsuitable. That’s that.
I would like to say also, that I have just completed a book, en-titled ‘With Men of Blood, O God’ and wonder would you be willing to read a copy of it?
Thanking you,
Bhaitear Ó Mhaicín
Having received a positive response from Macmillan he submitted the manuscript of his first novel to them on 13 December 1945. By this stage they had written to him to tell him that they had accepted his play for publication (they also arranged for its publication in America):
Whitestrand House.
13–12–’45
Dear Sir,
Naturally enough, I am very glad indeed that you find the play, ‘Mungo and the Mowleogs’ good enough to publish.
About the name of the play, it is altered by the Abbey Theatre to ‘Mungo’s Mansion’, they were of the same opinion as yourselves that the original name was too obscure and likely to injure the play with the public, so since both of you are agreed about that, ‘Mungo’s Mansion’ it will have to be.
About my own name, I have no objection at all to it being anglicised because I was born Walter Macken anyhow, but since I am a producer of Irish plays, I have to use the Irish version constantly, and I had an idea about my name being more appealing in its un-understandability, in the same way as the original name of the play.
Should we compromise and call me Walter Ó Maicín? I leave it to yourselves to choose either that or plain, Walter Macken, whichever is best from your point of view (and from my own eventually). Under separate cover, I have sent you a copy of ‘With Men of Blood O God’, and hope it’s of some use.
Thanking you again for your courtesy,
Walter Macken
My father and mother had an anxious few months waiting for the postman to arrive with the response to his first novel. Less than two months later, the publisher sent him the following letter:
Macmillan & Co. Ltd.,
St Martin’s Street,
London WC2.
7th February 1946
Dear Sir,
We have now spent some time considering the manuscript of your novel, ‘With Men of Blood, O God’. It is an original piece of work, and you are to be congratulated on the possession of a talent which can produce almost, it seems, simultaneously two works so dissimilar in treatment and form as the novel and your play. We have made an agreement with you for the publication of your play. We hope that it may be possible to arrange for the publication of the novel, but before proceeding to an agreement there are several points which we should like to discuss with you.
The good things in the book by far outweigh those which we might venture to criticise. There is a vigour to the story, quite remarkable characterisation, and fine passages of descriptive writing; all of which should commend it to the public. We feel, however, that the first chapter or two are not in key with the general tone of the book. A quieter beginning would be infinitely more effective. The details about Stephen’s birth, and the early adventures of his mother in service, seem unnecessary, and might, we suggest, put the reviewer against the book, not to speak of the general public who are inclined to glance at the preliminary chapter or two of a novel when they take it down from the library shelf. There are so many good chapters coming after; it seems a pity that their effect may be lost by these first chapters which are so different in tone from the rest.
We must speak with more hesitancy about the end. The reader of your novel is led to expect a ‘happy ending’; instead he is given a ruthlessly tragic one. It may well be that this is the way you saw the end while you were writing the book. If you have a strong conviction about it, we should not like to persuade you to change it; and an ending is undoubtedly more difficult to revise than the first chapters. We feel, however, that it is only fair to point out that the ending will come as a blow to many readers, who after so fine, so lively and realistic story, with many humorous elements in it, will feel themselves let down by a melodramatic conclusion. Perhaps you would consider this point and let us know what you think.
The book will make 432 pages of print. That is long
for a novel, and in these days of drastic paper shortage, length is sometimes detrimental to a book’s chances. If you could make some cuts when you are rewriting the first two chapters, and if any seem possible elsewhere when you re-read the MS, it would be helpful.
We hope you will realise how genuine is our interest in your work. We have a high regard for what you have attempted here. It is a good book as it stands, and the criticisms we have set out in this letter are meant only to improve its chances of publication. We are sending back the MS under separate cover, and we shall look forward to hearing from you when you have had a chance to consider the suggestions we make. Revision is never easy or pleasant to do, but we hope that in this case you may agree that it has been well worthwhile, and that the artistic integrity of the book has been in no way impaired.
We are,
Yours faithfully,
Macmillan & Co. Ltd.
Four days later, my father replied to their letter:
2 Whitestrand House.
11–2–’46
Dear Sir,
I thank you very much for your letter of the 7th, and as is only reasonable, I am glad that you think, ‘With Men of Blood, O God’ is not without merit and I hope sincerely that it may be possible for you to publish it. About your criticisms, I am grateful for them, because, you have forgotten more about books and the public than I would ever learn if I lived a lifetime.
I will take the first things first. Looking back over the first chapter, it seems to be more of a synopsis of another book than an introductory chapter, but my idea was to build up the character of the mother since she has such an effect on the life of her son. I note that the first two chapters comprise 32 pages. I will start into my story straight and compress these two chapters into one of about 10 or 12 pages, without, I hope, losing anything that has a bearing on what follows after. In the succeeding chapters I will cut lines here and there and eliminate in all about 20 more pages. Will that meet with your approval?
About the ending, I will have to make a speech at this point in order to try and explain what I have in mind.
Up to this time, the people of Connemara have been represented by writers (no names, no pack drill) as blue-eyed, misty colleens in red-petticoats and natural complexions, blushing charmingly at the approach of strangers, while the men were big and strong and silent, looking out over the Atlantic with large lumps of Celtic twilight aura-ating them like plaster saints. These people were set up like puppets with no feelings, in fact, emotional eunuchs. This of course is entirely false. I have tried to set them down as I know them. They are a very turbulent people. If I sent you a copy of the local papers for the past week you will see reports of fighting where they use knives and stones.
I myself saw two Connemara men fighting in a public square in Galway. The fight finished with one opponent taking the thumb of the other and biting clean through it. This of course is only one side of them and their break-outs are not as frequent as you may gather from all this. Apart from their emotional moments they are a nice kindly gentle people and as good company as you would wish to meet.
You would want to understand all this to know what I am saying in the end of the book is not melodrama but stark facts. A few years ago a soldier was attacked by three men. He received nearly sixty pen-knife wounds in the face and was left for dead. He recovered.
This is my point. Stephen in the book virtually murders Malachi. After that there can be no happy ending, from a moral sense, what I did was to make him suffer, but not to die, a fact which I don’t seem to have brought out very clearly in the end.
He is lying in the road with the doctor’s car approaching, and I want to leave an impression in the mind of the reader that the Doctor got to him in time, and that he is the author of the book, so that the reader will get a picture of a large man with many scars, hunched over a writing pad.
Also the readers will say to themselves, ‘Well after all, if he hadn’t suffered that way, he might have been hanged, and they can see the Judge saying, ‘You have suffered sufficiently for what you did in a moment of great stress, Stephen O’Riordan, I hereby sentence you to imprisonment dating from your arrest. Therefore you are free to go.’ That was my idea and I think it could be brought out more clearly which I will do.
So please, if you can, leave me with my ending and I am almost certain that the reader will get satisfaction out of it.
I want to thank you again for your helpful and courteous letter. It is very encouraging to think that publishers can be so helpful. That is why I hope we can come to an agreement on this novel, because I feel that as I gradually become more practised that some day I may be able to turn out work that is worthwhile.
Thanking you again and hoping to hear from you soon.
Yours sincerely,
Walter Macken
Macmillan replied to his letter on 19 February 1946:
Dear Sir,
Thank you for your letter of February 2nd. You have taken our suggestions very well, and we are sure that the alterations now agreed will greatly improve the book. As our earlier letter indicated we attach much more importance to compressing the first two chapters than to altering the end. Your defence of your own ending is spirited and persuasive, and we would not venture to press upon you any suggestion for altering it.
The MS will no doubt have reached you by now. When you have made the necessary alterations and excisions will you return it to us and we hope and expect then that it will be possible to come to an agreement for the publication of the book.
Within two weeks, my father had completed the re-writing and revisions and he sent the new MS back to Macmillan:
Whitestrand House.
3–3–’46
Dear Sir,
Keeping my fingers crossed, I enclose under separate cover the revised MS of the book ‘With Men of Blood, O God’ which I hope you will find acceptable.
The first two chapters of 33 pages have been telescoped into one chapter of 13 pages and going through the book I have cut out over 600 lines of typescript, which would be almost 18 pages as well as the 20 saved in the cutting of the early chapters. I think this has improved the book a lot, because it tightened it considerably, and it has given me the opportunity of eliminating unnecessary or uncomfortable passages, but of course you have the last word …
Hoping that this thing is now satisfactory.
I remain,
Yours sincerely,
Walter Macken
They acknowledged receipt of the revised manuscript on 8 March and by 9 April they wrote to him to tell him that they had accepted his revised edition of the novel. He replied with new suggestions for the title:
2 Whitestrand House.
15–4–’46
Dear Sir,
I thank you for your letter of the 9th, and needless to say am duly delighted that you find the book worth publishing. I find the terms satisfactory, and since these times are hard times will be glad of the advance with the signature of the Agreement.
With regard to the name, I have given it a lot of thought and have come up with quite a few. My favourite at the moment is ‘Here Comes the West Wind’ but in case you don’t like that I am enclosing herewith another list of names that you might like or other of them. ‘The Tide Flows Past’, ‘The Years are Empty’, ‘My House is Violent’, ‘The Man and the Mountain’, ‘I will wash My Hands’ and ‘The Earth is Brown’. If none of these suit, I will keep thinking and turning up something better on hearing from you again.
Thanking you,
Yours sincerely,
Walter Macken
Macmillan replied to my father’s letter within a few days. This time, for the first time in the correspondence I have from them, the letter was written and signed by Daniel Macmillan, one of the founders of the company:
Macmillan & Co. Ltd.
18th April 1946
Dear Mr Macken,
Thank you for your letter. I am glad that you find the proposed terms satisfactory, and I
enclose a formal agreement. If you will kindly sign this and return it to me I will send you a duplicate signed by ourselves and the £50 advance.
In the agreement I have called the book ‘Here Comes the West Wind’, but we will consider the other titles which you suggest. Anyhow there is no particular hurry, as the actual title need not be settled until the book is all set up and ready to put into pages.
Yours sincerely,
Daniel Macmillan
The publishers wrote again looking for some biographical in-formation which they could include in the dust jacket of his novel. They asked him for about 600 words as a profile, which he duly sent to them:
2 Whitestrand House.
10–5–’46
Dear Sir,
In answer to your letter of the 2nd, I enclose herewith the story of my life, with photographs. I’m sorry to say that I couldn’t stretch it to anything like 600 words and am dully appalled at the dull life I must have led up to this. About the copyright on the photograph, I am enclosing a letter from the photographer and if you find the photographs suitable maybe you could get in touch with him.
Here is the biographical note he wrote with the letter:
