‘If another single insufferably crass person uses that revoltingly unpleasant expression “lifestyle” again within my faint hearing I shall positively vomit.’
But to find action it’s time to go two footed again out into the night. The polo player Meenaghan leads one along Baggot Street. Whose several pubs have miraculously escaped wholesale change and whose interiors are now jammed. A lady from New Jersey on her first day ever in Ireland is attempting a samba across the floor. But here inside O’Donoghue’s there’s only room enough to stand up straight. The music makers are seated in a circle while listeners shoulder to shoulder are packed around them. A man plays the spoons bouncing them on his knees. Elbows are in your face while the publican takes orders and serves drinks standing up on the bar shouting out over the heads of the crowd. And finally, despite the pleasant music, the squeeze is just too tight.
We go dine at Dobbins down an ancient lane. Here there are rumoured to be diplomats and government cabinet ministers. Sawdust on the floor. Candles glow on the tables. And the many come here just to see and listen as the beautiful Fionnuala Monks exquisitely sings. And now with wine enough it’s late enough and at last I’ve got nerve enough to go to a nightclub. Meenaghan guaranteeing one will not be dismayed with le Cirque. And indeed dignity is already assured by its pale blue door set in grey ashlar stone. One is signed in on a visitors’ book lying open in an invitingly comfortable waiting room. Only for a moment does one think one’s name might be entering a mourners’ bereavement list in a funeral parlour.
And safely inside and night life ahead one thinks one encounters the strange overtones of the Adolf Loos bar in Vienna. But instead of hard shiny marble there are soft hued fabrics covering the furnishings. One sinks back in comfort savouring the fashionable people. Free of smoke, with music free of noise. Steps go down to a small temporarily empty dance floor where the coloured lights glint and blink across the shiny parquet. And I see no reason why an honest to God sophisticated American shouldn’t enjoy this bijou nightclub in the city where soda water was invented. And where from now on, they tell me, human rights to pleasure without pain are going to be thoroughly observed.
1987
The Bloom of a City
It was autumn in a year following the end of the Second World War, when I first walked through the soft rain that often falls on this ancient Irish capital of Dublin. The wet glistened on the mottled greyness of the blocks of granite pavement and turf smoke rose from the chimneys and scented the streets. Trams roared by on their tracks under skies whose tumbling clouds would by evening be gently tinted in hues of pink and grey. Seagulls swooped and squawked over the slate roof tops. A bone deep cold stayed in one’s feet through the night. And any pleasure one felt was mostly found in the mind.
One had already forgotten the rest of the world beyond this island when in my innocence I was invited by a charming tall Californian named James H. Leathers, with whom I shared college rooms, to go and have a cup of coffee. I was not to know that coffee in a coffee house was merely an introduction to the pubs which were jammed till closing time and that social gatherings in their spontaneous combustion could rage on through the night in this city where bitterness, backbiting and begrudgement were invented. And also that one might wake up two weeks later, miles distant from Dublin, wondering how one had got there.
Back in those days then, the modern world had little changed this Georgian metropolis gently spreading north and south from the banks of the River Liffey and reaching out into the Irish Sea around its bay. Out of teeming slums gangs of barefoot urchins then roamed the streets and black shawled women held out their hands to beg. Amid swarms of cyclists, horse carts thundered through the streets as if to guide the rattlingly old motor cars on their way. And with its worn Protestant elegance surrounded by a Catholic population, Trinity College sat a cloistered jewel in the city’s centre.
And now the millennium. But for me it is coming up to forty two years when I first alighted from the green upholstered tram to go by the red brick Dental Hospital with its skylights in the roof and from which I always expected to hear screams, to enter the back gate of Trinity. And there was the university through my apprehensive eyes. With pedestrians staring at me and my black and white collegiate saddle shoes, I had come past the exotic mock Byzantine towers of what once roofed over Dublin’s first steam bath. Architecture remaining, as it has long been in Dublin, a symbol of someone’s abortive crumbling dreams. I had also walked by a doorway with a brass plate ‘The Mission to Lepers’. And have since over the years specially travelled to stare at this doorway to wonder when it would finally disappear as so many other dignified artefacts of decency in this city have done. And I can now in this year of the millennium finally report it gone.
But Trinity College is still here with its cobbled stoned front square and its lawns still flat, green and velvet. Benches where one could sit reading, watching and wondering under the old trees when some remainder of summer was still hanging in the skies. But no longer does one hear the ringingly haughty voices of the West Brit and Anglo Irish for whom this institution was long an ancient trusted redoubt. And where once it was like crossing an empty stage upon which one might stop and declaim, my God it’s all so peaceful and beautiful. Now throngs of students flow by, perhaps even healthier and happier ones, but none of whom one expects to see break down and weep in thanksgiving for all this so beloved beatific, academic grandeur.
And if now in Dublin you hanker for yesteryear and quietly strolling elegance, head up Dawson Street and keep your eye peeled. Not far away, some such folk are still emerging out of the old clubs on St Stephen’s Green. They go by somehow silent and sadly grey. For there has long been contagious architectural sacrilege all over this town. And as one more unspeakable facing glares down from some new elevation, one clutches one’s heart in horror and rushes down to Molesworth Street to grasp a frisson of comfort. For across from the Masonic lodge still stays affixed and gleaming on a Georgian door the brass plate of the Protestant Orphan Society, albeit nearly polished beyond legibility. And still embedded in the pavement of this street are its old coal hole covers, each one original to itself. And one gives a sigh of relief.
Ah but upon this millennium native voices have been raised against the desecration of Dublin and all the blatant paddywhackery. For this present celebration is by some looked upon as a hyped up effort to attract these lorry loads of visitors from across the Atlantic to what one might too hastily say is a worn jagged toothed tourist trap. And here I was myself walking up a still vaguely venerable Dawson Street and in the billowing work dust, as I stood in front of the Lord Mayor’s house near the millennium candle flame, a refined Dublin gentleman said to his companion as they looked over the piles of cobble stones being installed on this forecourt in order to return it to its original eighteenth century splendour.
‘By God, isn’t there an awful lot of nostalgia breaking out all over the place.’
Tourist trap or not, nearly to everyone who gets there these days, Dublin’s tumble down shabbiness is mystifyingly charming enough. But you might guess that it is becoming increasingly harder to tell the difference between the former ruling class and the burgeoning brand of native Irish roaming all over the place as if it belonged to them. And these days, instead of bow legged monocled Masters of Foxhounds having porters behind lugging saddlery into the Shelbourne Hotel, the shiny suited or benign Protestant Catholic might be seen. But more likely it will be a charabanc come to park to unload its American tourists. And as the weather grows warm, this swarm increases and with them come the continental foreigners. Indeed in addition to the Book of Kells and Abbey Theatre, Dublin might even be said to have other genuine cultural attractions. For along with the neon glowing leprechauns leaping out at you from behind the aspidistras, lo and behold Ireland now presents to the foreigner’s often dumbfounded face, the faces of its once banned and shunned writers. Pictures of them everywhere and written of in travel brochures and alluded to in pubs,
restaurants and nightclubs all over the place. James Joyce on a postcard is even seen sprouting a green pair of wings. Every gombeen man is now alert to this phenomenon as he stands behind his counter ready to be able to reel off at least the name of the book the man wrote. For why hold a few ould dirty, disgusting thoughts against a genius. For by God if there’s money to be made out of literature why not make it while their world wide reputations last out the summer.
So in the places of pleasure newly opened all over Dublin, recognition for these once upon a time dirty minded men has now become the rage. There’s James Joyce this and Beckett that. The Bloom this and the Wilde that. With a Molly more than mentioned here and there. If you’re heading for the airport, you can even get a taxi driver to bring you past Brendan Behan Court, not far from where that gentleman was born and bred, with a sky blue plaque up on the wall to mark the place. Behan, of course, was a true Dubliner, who gave this city its life. Swaggering conspicuously through the streets in the terrifying looking company of Lead Pipe Daniel the Dangerous, he would not hesitate to shout to even the most mildly known of acquaintances, me included.
‘How’s your hammer hanging.’
Although I didn’t disappear into doorways without answering, it wasn’t for a number of years that I discovered I was misinterpreting this. Behan, who despite his wild unkempt appearance and explosive rhetoric, could be the epitome of indulgent reasonableness, explained to me that it was not in any way meant to allude to the possible state of one’s private, but was a long established greeting sounded between professionals who worked up on scaffolds in the building and decorating trades. However, even when I had spread this acceptable news, especially among the Anglo Irish, no one with their mother or maiden aunt in tow would enter Grafton Street with Brendan Behan in sight.
But of course remember that it was in bygone days only through the written word that obscenity could reach these shores. Then came the antennae. Reaching high into the sky over nearly every Dublin roof top. They shook and shivered in the winds as the amorally nude images beamed in leaping alive in Technicolor. Now pornography is less than discreetly sold in shops over the counter in this land where once an author’s manuscript branded prurient could be stolen or burnt and his books certainly banned. Ah but wait, and have it said too, that here and now things have dramatically changed. All the ills befallen these past scribblers who lurked the Dublin streets have been redressed. Authors and even obscene painters are seen contentedly strolling down Grafton Street, counting their blessings and their earnings from their works tax free. And they might stop now to listen to the new generation of street entertainer on stage in their doorways, who can actually sing and play a note and attract donations. Or smile at an earnest poet approaching who offers a sheet for sale of one of his poems.
So something is different and better in this city so long known as dear and dirty. Voices raised against gombeenism and paddywhackery. And God forbid, even the Catholic Church. And more than a tasteful thing or two can be seen as the city hurries to clean itself up. Daffodils along the new highway to the airport. The main road through Phoenix Park lined with fresh painted lampstandards gleaming with their copper caps. The surface of Grafton Street, once paved by wooden blocks on which many a cyclist skidded to their knees and long a fabled ancient thoroughfare of shopping elegance, has been torn up and replaced by a neat brick walkway. Which now, nearly at the bottom, workmen race to finish. All appropriate enough that the population can now linger here unmolested by the motor car. For once this street served as if it were the main hall of a big country house where you would see inmates wandering back and forth. They were mostly the versifying bucoliasts who had just placed a bet with their turf accountants and were repairing to one public house or another to await the race results.
And in talking of Grafton Street there is one premises which seems to have remained long after all the others have vanished. Bewley’s Oriental Café. But even this venerable hold out which once sent the smell of roasted coffee beans up and down the street has finally gone the way of all progress. Its entranceway is now lined with glass cases selling exotic comestibles in the manner of a shiny delicatessen boutique and its once famed waitress service is now sadly reduced. But deeper inside some of the crimson banquettes are still there to sit on and a fire glows in at least one grate. But more important than all, one of Bewley’s last elegant waitresses still plies her marvellous friendly trade. Her exquisite dignity to and fro as she gently gets for you what you want. And remembering what you had from one visit to another. Her meticulous diction as she glances out over the new pedestrian thoroughfare and remarks upon the mood of the day. And this is how this staff once presided, knowing their customers came here to more than sup and talk but also to dream.
In this recent thousand years the city has sprawled and clawed its way in all landward directions. Across the surrounds of Dublin, suburbia sprouts everywhere. And considering this is a country where not a plethora have a pot to piss in, some of the most amazingly palatial houses are to be newly seen brazenly boasting their conspicuous worth on their landscaped acres. But mostly housing and council estates creep out upon the emerald grasses. The great old mansions swallowed up, the ancient cottages and barns tumbling derelict and abandoned. The litter blows wild as the vandals and loose dogs roam. Yet on these regimented streets there are neat pretty little gardens and newly planted trees. And a social justice reigns here. For abandoned wives and the unemployed. Roofs over their heads and their children have enough to eat. And one thing is for sure in this millennium, that everyone with a new hat and presentable car is trying their damnedest to keep up with the O’Reillys and Kellys. And those handful with horses, to keep up with the Fetherstonhaughs.
God above no longer holds this city as devoutly unique. Shaking it as he has recently done with the tremors of an earthquake. Although pub rumour has it that it was a million Orangemen with their lambeg drums practising to march down here to celebrate the millennium. But somehow one feels that this shabby unloved capital may once more come to inspire and ennoble and give comfort to the spirit as it once did. There’s still the smell of grass in St Stephen’s Green. Ducks cruising on its ponds. Birds defiantly blasting out their song up in its leafy trees. Tulips, red, purple and yellow, burst forth from garden beds around which Dubliners stroll and children chase pigeons. There’s even a tiny sylvan enclosure for the blind where they can touch copper plates of braille and read the identity of the shrubs they can sniff and feel. Amenities enough you might say. Plus a monument erected in remembrance of those who gave public service to the enfranchisement of women.
But don’t go away yet. It’s early afternoon, the sun out, a mild pleasant May day. Walk with me west in this city on these ancient narrow streets. Each wall, door and window I pass now the old Dublin begins to return. Bleak and shabby just as it was then. But to the Dubliner this would be Dublin. It was here where George Moore was born. It was here, too, where I would occasionally go to drink in a pub called the Bleeding Horse with a Michael Heron, my brother in law, who delightedly with his public school accent would bargain with the barrow women for his pound of tomatoes. But to stalk these streets too long would seize you up with sorrow. I made myself turn into a church. And walked up its long vestibule. Candles burning and a smell of incense. Inside further doors an organ was playing and voices singing and the pews were packed. A priest up on the altar in his braided raiment. Two friars in their brown long robes came down an aisle, both with devout humility. Here alive and living was the Dublin I once knew. These women opening their handbags in front of tiers of burning candles. Their coins clanking into the offering boxes with the terrible pagan sound of slot machines in Las Vegas. But these coins fell in prayer and gave hope and solace. This is a Dublin which had survived. With the hardship of life. As I walked out, voices made familiar greetings to one another. And I had not gone far up the street when at last a horse cart miraculously came clip clop around the corner. And through the night as I lay awake in
the Shelbourne Hotel, revellers were passing. Instead of the strange defiant, inebriate shouts one might hear in yesteryear, those wandering below were singing and laughing. Proof enough that the celebration of the millennium is for real.
1988
The De Alfonce Bank
We are happy to advise that there is no need any longer to wake up scratching your head upon learning that your money has vanished in a series of dud investments or in corporate bankruptcy, not to mention the billions squandered in the treacherous financial chaos of third world countries. And the following confidential matter is disclosed for your immediate consideration.
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J.P. Donleavy Page 24
