On Wednesday I was a guest at an event
organised by Queen’s University Belfast, as an Irish crime writer. '"Thinking Forward Through the Past", a day of events across
Belfast profiling the impact of research within the Faculty of Arts,
Humanities and Social Sciences.' They mentioned me in the flier
and everything, which was quite cool.
My invitation to this event came from Dr Dominique Jeannerod, a French guy with incredibly good taste in
Irish crime fiction. I say this with modesty intact; he hasn’t read
my books. Yet. The good Dr Jeannerod kicked off the proceedings with
a fascinating presentation on the impact of Irish crime fiction in
France. Ken Bruen was described as the most famous among this
exclusive set of aficionados who have had their work translated and
published in France. Stuart Neville is also a prominent diplomat for
the genre, and fair play to the Armagh lad for representing the
latest generation of Northern Irish crime writers in such a
discerning country. I feel qualified to describe French readers as
discerning as I paid very close attention to the presentation. It
held my interest despite knowing that I was soon to be interviewed by
somebody with an impressive and intimidating wealth of knowledge in
Irish crime fiction.
And rather than warm me up with a few
easy questions, he hit me with this tricky one-two:
Are you comfortable with the
description, Irish crime writer?
Are you equally comfortable with being
included in THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF BEST BRITISH CRIME or is that a
contradiction?
Can of worms, meet chainsaw.
I can't remember what I said, word for
word, but I'll rehash the gist of it...
I think it took me longer to get
comfortable with calling myself a writer than it did to figure out my
national identity. It was after the publication of THE POINT,
actually, in October 2011. I'd achieved a decent amount before then,
short story publications, co-editing a crime fiction anthology and
Arts Council funding – I'd come excruciatingly close to publication
with my novel WEE ROCKETS a couple of times as well. But it wasn't
until I had the pleasure of signing paperback copies of my novella at
No Alibis that I could look somebody in the eye and say, “Aye, I'm
a writer, so I am.”
The Irish thing? Well, when it comes to
ticking boxes on an application form, I'll pick Northern Irish if
it's there, Irish if it's not. I was born south of the border but
have lived in the North since I was six years old. I say Derry, not
Londonderry. It 's a habit that comes from growing up Catholic. But I
don't practice the faith I inherited except to go to christenings,
weddings and funerals. But, yes, I'm comfortable with calling myself
an Irish crime writer. And I'll not turn my nose up at the
sub-categorisation of Northern Irish crime writer either.
Do I belong in THE MAMMOTH BOOK OF BEST
BRITISH CRIME?
Well, I have a British passport. A
couple of years ago, I needed one fast and couldn't be arsed going to
Dublin for it. How's that for swallowing your cultural heritage? A
past version of myself might have been appalled at my lack of Irish
pride. Nowadays, I'm not that bothered. It's just a wee red book. And
TMBBBC is a big read book. I was honoured to have my story in a
collection with some of the biggest names in British crime fiction
(and a couple of great Irish writers who were also happy with the
contradiction). In fact, I'd probably have been pissed off if being
Irish had disqualified me. That British passport entitles me, you
know!
The event lasted an hour and a half,
but Dr Jeannerod (he may prefer Dominique, but I really like the look
of Dr Jeannerod) didn't get through all of his questions. I got a
copy of them from him and over the next week I'm going to select a
handful and basically interview myself... with somebody
else's questions. If that seems horribly self-indulgent to you,
consider this post fair warning and avoid the blog for a week two.
2 comments:
Very interesting post, Gerard. Your sense of national identity, in that it doesn't conform to the either/or dogma, is becoming more the norm in Norn Iron of recent surveys and census results are anything to go by. As someone from Protestant background, I have no problem with being Irish, Northern Irish, British, or any combination of the three. Like you, I'd tick the Northern Irish box before anything else.
I think most people here have moved beyond the cultural and political ghettos of unionism and nationalism. The shame of it is the politicians haven't. While most ordinary voters are primarily concerned with keeping food on their tables, the education and health of their children, their prospects of holding on to their jobs - you know, the sort of thing most people in the developed world are preoccupied with - our political system is still organised around a constitutional question that few people are really asking these days. We've made a lot of progress here, but still our elections are essentially sectarian head counts. I may do a more detailed blog post about that myself over the coming weeks.
It's also interesting that a French interviewer cuts straight to the politics. It's been my experience of touring in France that journalists there are far more interested in the politics of my writing than anything else. It gets a little awkward when they expect me to have detailed insights into our past, present and future. Which I don't.
Thanks for dropping by, Stuart. Your thoughtful insights are always welcome here, sir.
Ah, the politicians. I look forward to your post. No doubt I'll nick the phrase, "sectarian head counts" in the near future too. There's a ring (of truth) to it.
I've pitched the idea of a new NI political party to friends more than once after a few pints. It hasn't taken off yet. Probably because I end up making it sound more like a weird hippy cult than anything else. The idea could use some refinement, by somebody who's less of an eejit than me.
Dominique mentioned to me more than once that it's the potential for political insight that attracts French readers to NI crime fiction books. He was talking about you and Eoin McNamee at the time, interestingly enough. And although it's not set in Belfast, I'd love to know what your French fans make of Ratlines when it's translated.
Cheers
gb
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