Irish Journal Read online

  Longer and longer grew the line-up at the counter where the nectar of Western Europe was available in generous quantities for a small sum: tea, as if the Irish were doing their utmost not to surrender this world record held by them just ahead of England: almost ten pounds of tea are consumed annually per head in Ireland; enough tea to fill a small swimming pool must flow down every Irish throat every year.

  As I slowly moved along in the line-up I had time to recall the other Irish world records: this little country holds not only the tea-drinking record, but also the one for the consecration of new priests (the Archdiocese of Cologne would have to consecrate nearly a thousand new priests a year to compete with a small archdiocese in Ireland); the third world record held by Ireland is that of moviegoing (again—how much in common despite the differences!—just ahead of England); finally the fourth, a significant one of which I dare not say it stands in causal relationship to the first three: in Ireland there are fewer suicides than anywhere else on earth. The records for whisky-drinking and cigarette-smoking have not yet been ascertained, but in these disciplines Ireland is also well ahead, this little country the size of Bavaria but with fewer inhabitants than those between Essen and Dortmund.

  A cup of tea at midnight, while standing shivering in the west wind as the steamer pushes slowly out to the open sea—then a whisky upstairs in the bar, where the throaty Celtic was still to be heard, but from only one Irish throat now. In the room off the bar, nuns settled like great birds getting ready for the night, warm under their headdresses, their long habits, drawing in their long rosaries as ropes are drawn in when a boat leaves; a young man standing at the bar with a baby in his arms was refused a fifth glass of beer, his wife, who was standing beside him holding a little girl of two, also had her glass taken away by the bartender without a refill. The bar slowly emptied, the throaty Celtic was silent, the nuns’ heads were gently nodding in sleep; one of them had forgotten to draw in her rosary, the plump beads rolled to and fro with the movement of the ship. Carrying their children, the couple who had been refused a drink swayed past me toward a corner where they had built themselves a little fort out of suitcases and cardboard boxes. Two more children were asleep over there, leaning on either side of their grandmother, whose black shawl seemed to offer warmth for three. The baby and its two-year-old sister were stowed away in a laundry basket and covered up; the parents crept silently in between two suitcases, their bodies pressed close together, and the man’s thin white hand spread a raincoat over them like an awning. Silence; the suitcase locks clinked gently to the rhythm of the moving ship.

  I had forgotten to get myself a place for the night. I clambered over legs, boxes, suitcases. Cigarettes glowed in the dark; I caught scraps of whispered conversation: “Connemara … no luck … waitress in London.” I crouched between some lifeboats and lifebelts, but the west wind was keen and damp. I stood up, made my way across the ship, which one would have thought full of emigrants rather than homecomers—legs, glowing cigarettes, scraps of whispered conversation—till a priest grasped the bottom of my coat and with a smile invited me to sit down next to him. I leaned back to sleep, but to the right of the priest, under a green and gray striped blanket, a light clear voice was speaking: “No, Father, no, no … it hurts too much to think of Ireland. Once a year I have to go there to visit my parents, and my grandmother is still alive. Do you know County Galway?”

  “No,” murmured the priest.

  “Connemara?”

  “No.”

  “You should go there, and don’t forget on your way back in the port of Dublin to notice what’s exported from Ireland: children and priests, nuns and biscuits, whisky and horses, beer and dogs.…”

  “My child,” said the priest gently, “you should not mention these things in the same breath.”

  A match flared under the green-gray blanket, a sharp profile was visible for a second or two.

  “I don’t believe in God,” said the light clear voice, “no, I don’t believe in God—so why shouldn’t I mention priests and whisky, nuns and biscuits, in the same breath? I don’t believe in Kathleen ni Houlihan either, that fairy-tale Ireland.… I was a waitress in London for two years: I’ve seen how many loose women.…”

  “My child,” said the priest in a low voice.

  “… how many loose women Kathleen ni Houlihan has sent to London, the isle of the saints.”

  “My child!”

  “That’s what the priest back home used to call me too: my child. He used to come on his bike, a long way, to read Mass to us on Sundays, but even he couldn’t stop Kathleen ni Houlihan exporting her most precious possession: her children. Go to Connemara, Father—I’m sure you’ve never seen so much lovely scenery, with so few people in it, all at once. Perhaps you can read Mass to us one Sunday, then you’ll see me kneeling devoutly in church.”

  “I thought you didn’t believe in God.”

  “But d’you suppose I could afford—or be so cruel to my parents—not to go to church? ‘Our daughter is still the same devout, good girl, such a good daughter.’ And my grandmother kisses me when I go home, blesses me and says: ‘Stay as devout as you are, dear child!’ … Do you know how many grandchildren my grandmother has?”

  “My child, my child,” said the priest gently.

  The cigarette glowed sharply, revealing the severe profile for a second.

  “My grandmother has thirty-six grandchildren, thirty-six. She used to have thirty-eight, one was shot down in the Battle of Britain, another one went down with a British submarine—there are thirty-six still alive; twenty in Ireland, the others.…”

  “There are countries,” said the priest in a low voice, “that export hygiene and suicide ideas, nuclear weapons, machine guns, automobiles.…”

  “Oh I know,” said the light, clear girlish voice, “I know all about that: I’ve a brother myself who is a priest, and two cousins, they’re the only ones in the whole family who have cars.”

  “My child.…”

  “I’m going to try and get some sleep now—goodnight, Father, goodnight.”

  The glowing cigarette flew over the railing, the green-gray blanket was pulled snugly around the slim shoulders, the priest’s head shook rhythmically from side to side; but perhaps it was only the rhythm of the ship that was moving his head.

  “My child,” he said once more in a low voice, but there was no answer.

  He leaned back with a sigh, turned up his coat collar; there were four safety pins on the underside as a reserve; four, hanging from a fifth that was stuck in at right angles, swinging from side to side in time with the gentle thrusts of the steamer as it headed into the gray darkness toward the isle of saints.

  2

  ARRIVAL II

  A cup of tea, at dawn, while standing shivering in the west wind, the isle of saints still hiding from the sun in the morning mist; here on this island, then, live the only people in Europe that never set out to conquer, although they were conquered several times, by Danes, Normans, Englishmen—all they sent out was priests, monks, missionaries who, by way of this strange detour via Ireland, brought the spirit of Thebaic asceticism to Europe; here, more than a thousand years ago, so far from the center of things, as if it had slipped way out into the Atlantic, lay the glowing heart of Europe.…

  So many green-gray blankets drawn snugly around slim shoulders, so many sharp profiles, and on so many turned-up priests’ collars the reserve safety pin stuck in at right angles with two, three, or four more pins dangling from it … thin faces, bleary eyes, in the laundry basket the baby drinking its bottle while at the tea counter the father was vainly struggling to get some beer. Slowly the morning sun picked white houses out of the mist, a lighthouse barked red-and-white toward the ship, slowly the steamer panted into the harbor of Dun Laoghaire. Seagulls greeted it, the gray silhouette of Dublin became visible, vanished again; churches, monuments, docks, a gasometer: tentative wisps of smoke from a few fireplaces: breakfast time, but only for a few: Ireland was s
till asleep, porters down on the dock rubbed the sleep from their eyes, taxi drivers shivered in the morning wind. Irish tears greeted home and the homecomers. Names were tossed back and forth like balls.

  I staggered wearily from the ship into the train, and a few minutes later from the train into the great dark railway station of Westland Row, from there onto the street: a young woman was just lifting an orange milk jug into the room from the window sill of a black house; she smiled at me, and I smiled back.

  Now I had no idea, although I soon began to suspect, that the hours between seven and ten in the morning are the only ones during which the Irish incline toward taciturnity, for whoever I asked, and whatever I asked about, I received the brief answer: “Sorry.” Like the German apprentice in Amsterdam in the old tale who supposed that everything he asked about belonged to Mr. Kannitverstan, since that was the only word he ever heard in answer to his questions, so I would have liked to ask: Who owns the big ships in the harbor? “Sorry.” Who is that standing up there all by himself in the morning mist on a pedestal? “Sorry.” Who do these ragged, barefoot children belong to? “Sorry.” Who is this mysterious young man standing on the back platform of the bus so skillfully imitating a machine gun—tok tok tok tok? “Sorry.” And who is that riding by with his crop and his gray top hat? “Sorry.” But I decided not to try and apply my meager knowledge of the language and to rely more on my eyes than my tongue or the ears of other people, and to study the shop signs instead. And there they all came rushing to meet me as bookkeepers, innkeepers, greengrocers—Joyce and Yeats, McCarthy and Molloy, O’Neill and O’Connor, even Jackie Coogan’s footsteps seemed to lead here, and I was forced to admit that the man up there on the pedestal, still looking so forlorn in the chill of the morning, was of course not Mr. Sorry but Nelson.

  I bought a paper, something called The Irish Digest, and, drawn by a sign promising “Bed and Breakfast Reasonable,” decided on a reasonable breakfast.

  If Continental tea is like a faded yellow telegraph form, in these islands to the west of Ostend it has the dark, glimmering tones of Russian icons, before the milk gives it a color similar to the complexion of an overfed baby; on the Continent weak tea is served in fragile porcelain, here it is casually poured into thick earthenware cups from battered metal teapots, a heavenly brew to restore the traveler, dirt cheap too.

  The breakfast was good, the tea worthy of renown, and thrown in for free was the smile of the young Irish girl who served it.

  I glanced through the paper and the first thing I saw was a letter demanding that Nelson be brought down from his high perch and replaced by a statue of the Virgin Mary. Another letter demanding Nelson’s downfall, then another.…

  It was now eight o’clock, tongues were loosened, I was engulfed in words of which I only understood one: Germany. I decided to strike back, in friendly but determined fashion, with the weapon of the country, “Sorry,” and to enjoy the free smiles of the tousled tea goddess, when a sudden roar, a sound almost like thunder, startled me. Could there be so many trains on this strange island? The thunder continued, became articulate, the powerful opening bars of the Tantum ergo beginning with Sacramentum—veneremur cernui became distinguishable, and sung clear and true to the last syllable it pealed out over Westland Row from St. Andrew’s Church opposite, and just as the first cups of tea were as good as all the others I would drink—in desolate, dirty little hamlets, in hotels and by firesides—so I was left with the impression of an overwhelming piety as it flooded Westland Row after the Tantum ergo: in Germany you would only see that many people coming out of church after Easter Mass or at Christmas; but I had not forgotten the confession of the unbeliever with the sharp profile.

  It was still only eight in the morning, Sunday, too early to wake my host: but the tea was cold, the café smelled of mutton fat, the customers were gathering up their boxes and suitcases and heading for their buses. Listlessly I turned the pages of The Irish Digest, haltingly translated the beginnings of some articles and short stories till a one-line aphorism on page 23 caught my eye: I understood it long before I would have been able to translate it: untranslated, not in German and yet understood, it was even more effective than if it had been rendered into German: The cemeteries, it said, are full of people the world could not do without.

  This wisdom seemed to me to be worth a trip to Dublin, and I made up my mind to lock it securely in my heart for the moments when I would be feeling my importance (later on it seemed to me a kind of key to this strange mixture of passion and equability, to that temperamental weariness, that indifference coupled with fanaticism, which I was to encounter so often).

  Great cool private houses lay hidden behind rhododendrons, behind palm trees and oleander bushes, when I had decided to wake my host despite the barbarically early hour: mountains became visible in the background, long rows of trees.

  Eight hours later a German compatriot was declaring categorically to me: “Everything here is dirty, everything is expensive, and nowhere can you get a proper châteaubriand,” and already I was defending Ireland, although I had only been in the country ten hours, ten hours out of which I had slept for five, bathed for one, spent one in church, argued for one with my compatriot, who could pit six months against my ten hours. I defended Ireland passionately, fought with tea, Tantum ergo, Joyce and Yeats against the châteaubriand, which was particularly dangerous for me since I didn’t know what it was (it was not till long after I got home that I had to look it up to identify it: a kind of steak, it said), I just sensed dimly, as I fought it, that it must be a meat dish—but my struggle was in vain; the man going abroad would like to forego the disadvantages of his native land—all that rushing about at home!—but take his châteaubriand with him; probably one cannot drink tea in Rome with impunity, any more than one can drink coffee in Ireland with impunity, except perhaps in the home of an Italian. I gave up the struggle, drove back in the bus, and marveled at the endless line-ups in front of the movies, of which there seemed to be plenty: in the morning, I thought, they crowd into and around the churches, and in the evening apparently into and around the movies; at a green newsstand I fell victim again to the smile of an Irish girl, bought newspapers, cigarettes, chocolate, then my eye fell on a book lying unnoticed among pamphlets: its white cover, bordered in red, was already soiled; secondhand, I could have it for a shilling, and I bought it. It was Goncharov’s Oblomov, translated into English. Although I knew Oblomov’s home to be some two or three thousand miles farther east, I suspected that he was not out of place in this country, where everyone hates to get up early in the morning.

  3

  PRAY FOR THE SOUL OF MICHAEL O’NEILL

  At Swift’s tomb my heart had caught a chill, so clean was St. Patrick’s Cathedral, so empty of people and so full of patriotic marble figures, so deep under the cold stone did the desperate Dean seem to lie, Stella beside him: two square brass plates, burnished as if by the hand of a German housewife: the larger one for Swift, the smaller for Stella; I wished I had some thistles, hard, big, long-stemmed, a few clover leaves, and some thornless, gentle blossoms, jasmine perhaps or honeysuckle; that would have been the right thing to offer these two, but my hands were as empty as the church, just as cold and just as clean. Regimental banners hung side by side, half-lowered: did they really smell of gunpowder? They looked as if they did, but the only smell was of mold, as in every church where for centuries no incense has been burned; I felt as though I were being bombarded with needles of ice; I fled, and it was only in the entrance that I saw there was someone in the church after all: the cleaningwoman; she was washing down the porch with lye, cleaning what was already clean enough.

  In front of the cathedral stood an Irish beggar, the first I had met: beggars like this one are only to be found otherwise in southern countries, but in the south the sun shines: here, north of the 53rd parallel, rags and tatters are something different from south of the 30th parallel; rain falls on poverty, and here even an incorrigible esthete could no l
onger regard dirt as picturesque; in the slums around St. Patrick’s, squalor still huddles in many a corner, many a house, exactly as Swift must have seen it in 1743.

  Both the beggar’s coatsleeves hung empty at his sides; these coverings for limbs he no longer possessed were dirty; epileptic twitching ran like lightning across his face, and yet his thin, dark face had a beauty that will be noted in a book other than mine. I had to light his cigarette for him and place it between his lips; I had to put money for him in his coat pocket: I almost felt as if I were furnishing a corpse with money. Darkness hung over Dublin: every shade of gray between black and white had found its own little cloud, the sky was covered with a plumage of innumerable grays: not a streak, not a scrap of Irish green; slowly, twitching, the beggar from St. Patrick’s Park crossed over under this sky into the slums.

  In the slums dirt sometimes lies in black flakes on the windowpanes, as if thrown there on purpose, fished up from fireplaces, from canals; but things don’t happen here so easily on purpose, and not much happens by itself: drink happens here, love, prayer, and cursing. God is passionately loved and no doubt equally passionately hated.