Expat Literary Hero

 They began to raise their voices.
 «Now we have a Fascist dictatorship!»
 «Instead of a Communist one!»
 People sitting near us looked uncomfortable. As for me, I was becoming, strangely and unexpectedly, aroused.
  —Excerpt from Chapter 11 of Searching for Cunégonde

There is something empowering about writing fiction. When you pen a novel, you experience the illusion of being God. You create people. You make them do what you want. You have total control of their fates. You can bestow them with good fortune or you can punish them with senseless tragedy. Their destinies are pretty much literally in your hands.

In practice, it doesn’t really feel that way. Characters—even ones you create yourself—have a way of taking on lives of their own. I think most authors have the strange experience of finding they are channeling their characters rather than controlling them. Your own characters sometimes do things you did not plan or want. Events sometimes take a turn you didn’t see coming when you started out.

These are interesting things to ponder but are probably best left for my book blog where I announced this week the publication of my fifth novel Searching for Cunégonde. More pertinent to this space is the fact that, when one writes a story set in a particular time and place, one is generally constrained by real-world events and situations.

The new book continues the adventures of Dallas Green, the protagonist of Maximilian and Carlotta Are Dead and Lautaro’s Spear. More pertinent to this space is the background provided by the real world to his story. In all three books, he is a picaresque hero journeying through the strange world in which he finds himself. The first novel was set in 1971, the time of the Vietnam War, the military draft in the U.S., and political unrest in Central America. The second book took place in 1980, the year of a U.S. presidential campaign, Ronald Reagan’s election, the sixth Deauville American Film Festival, and a constitutional referendum in Chile.

The new tome splits its narrative mainly between two different time periods. One strand picks up directly after the end of Lautaro’s Spear in December 1980 and proceeds through the following year. These bits alternate with events in the year 1993. This larger scope allowed me to draw in all sorts of historical references. Dallas experiences several weeks of comfortable living under the Pinochet dictatorship as well as venturing into Argentina, also governed by a military junta. There is then a return to California which not only provides a contrast between South and North America but also an implicit comparison between the rural San Joaquin Valley and the suburbs of the Bay Area. Indeed there are a number of contrasts drawn in this story, for example two very different funerals in two very distinct cultures.

By the time this leg of Dallas’s journey ends, he has become all too acquainted with the violent latter days of Ireland’s Troubles. He has also become a nearly unwitting participant in the bad old days of the Cold War, and he even gets to witness the single most symbolic moment of the fall of Communism.

If I have made Dallas’s exploits sound as if they are all about politics, then I have misled you. In this book, as in the others, the heart of the story is really in the friendships. There is some romance as well, or at least as much romance as a neo-Lost-Generation baby-boomer can manage in a cynical world. He finds himself in bed with an interesting array of lovers and not-quite lovers.

At one point someone compares him to the hero of Voltaire’s Candide, thus tipping my hand. That is how I have always seen him—someone more or less politically innocent, wandering the world with wide eyes and bearing witness to the strangeness and wonder of the wider world.

Appropriately enough for this blog, in the course of this novel Dallas becomes an expat. I tried to capture at least a bit of the disorientation that comes with adjusting to a different culture and functioning in a different language. In the end, though, the goal was always to entertain. Mainly to entertain myself, but in the hope that others might be inadvertently entertained as well.

The paperback edition of Searching for Cunégonde is available from major online booksellers, including Amazon and Barnes and Noble. The digital version is available from Amazon’s Kindle store, Barnes and Noble’s Nook store, Kobo, Google Play and Apple iBooks. For those links and other information, kindly consult my book blog.

Peacemaker

“He focused on unity and peace and giving that dignity to every person. We should never underestimate how difficult it was for John to cross the road and do what was intensely unpopular for the greater good.”
  —Father Paul Farren, in his homily at the funeral of John Hume, August 5

One major impact the pandemic has had on Irish society is the curtailment of large, public funerals. Along with weddings, christenings and First Holy Communions, the funeral is one of those rituals the define the Irish character and survives even in a time when regular Mass-going has dropped precipitously.

It is a sad irony that, among the many funerals held during this strangely becalmed period, was that of John Hume in early August. If his send-off in his native Derry had been commensurate with his contribution to life on this island, it would have been a massive affair. Instead, like the man himself it was restrained and dignified and somewhat overshadowed by large events. As it was, though, in the spite of the restrictions the attendance was impressive. Mourners included Northern Ireland’s deputy and first ministers, Ireland’s president, Taoiseach and foreign minister, and the UK’s secretary of state for Northern Ireland. Tributes were read out, including those from the Pope, the Dalai Lama, Bill Clinton, Boris Johnson and, inevitably, U2’s Bono.

Appropriately, in the evening on the day of his death, the Irish state broadcaster aired Maurice Fitzpatrick’s excellent documentary In the Name of Peace: John Hume in America. It was a fitting homage to the man, and I would heartily recommend anyone with an interest in Ireland’s history or current affairs to take any opportunity to see it. I was fortunate enough to attend the film’s world premiere at the 2017 Galway Film Fleadh and also attend a panel discussion including the filmmaker and former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern, who was in office when the Good Friday peace agreement was signed.

Since Hume’s passing, I have done much pondering of what an extraordinary man he was and why we see so few like him in public life. I suppose there are moments when the times require a particular kind of person and they somehow find him or her. When things are going well, such people are ignored in favor of the ambitious and opportunistic.

You could say that Hume was just smarter than other politicians. His strategy led to a peace agreement for Northern Ireland because he saw that there was more chance of success if he got the United States’ leadership on board. Moreover, unlike many politicians, he recognized that there needed to be recognition of legitimate concerns of both sides in the dispute and that an agreement had to benefit both sides. You hear precious little talk like that these days among politicians in Belfast, Dublin, London or Washington.

All that, however, still isn’t the most extraordinary thing about Hume’s achievement. He undertook a course for finding peace in his country, knowing full well that it could doom his own political party and his own career. That is exactly what happened, but he did it anyway because he had his eye on the greater good. Once the peace was secured, unionists and nationalists—whether out of fear or out of a need for retrenchment—abandoned the dominant moderate parties (the Ulster Unionist Party and the Social Democratic and Labour Party) that had negotiated the peace and switched their votes to more extreme parties (the Democratic Unionist Party and Sinn Féin). Those two parties have governed Northern Ireland in partnership ever since, while the UUP and SDLP have become shadows of the former selves. The peace process also took a personal toll on Hume, as his health went into decline.

Does the rise of the DUP and Sinn Féin mean the peace accord wasn’t worth it? Hardly. There was not only a persistent drop in the province’s political violence, but we were treated to the spectacle an unexpectedly cordial friendship between bitter old enemies Ian Paisley and Martin McGuinness. They became so comfortable with each other that wags dubbed them the “Chuckle Brothers.”

Things have been by no means smooth in Northern Ireland, and things look to get dicey with Brexit looming, but only very sick minds regret the end of the Troubles. That would not have been possible without John Hume and his willingness to put peace and cooperation above his own personal interests. It will not be lost on cynics, however, that the careers which flourished as a result of Hume’s efforts were those of Paisley, who had stirred the fires of sectarianism, and Adams, who had reportedly been an active participant in the violence of the Troubles.

When looking at my own country these days and the increasingly bitter estrangement between those on different political sides, I wonder if there is an American John Hume out there somewhere who would sacrifice his or her political career to bring the two sides together. Sometimes people surprise you, but right now I don’t see anybody on the political scene who isn’t in it for themselves or their own side.

Will things have to get even worse before the times finally produce someone of John Hume’s caliber?

Country Mice, City Mice

“Drink Driving, Grants for TD’s Constituency, Character References for Criminals: Fianna Fáil Are Back Baby!”
  —Headline on the satirical Irish newspaper website Waterford Whispers News, July 8

“A Cabinet Fit for Cromwell,” proclaimed a headline in the County Mayo-based Western People newspaper four weeks ago. That’s no small amount of pique or annoyance for a Connacht publication to express. To this day, one hears the name of England’s 17th-century military leader and Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell invoked with a revulsion so enduring it feels as though the swath his army cut through Ireland occurred only a week ago.

What cabinet sparked such a visceral reaction in a regional newspaper? Was it a ministerial shuffle by Boris Johnson in the UK or perhaps some dodgy compromise in the Northern Ireland Assembly? No, it was directed at the Republic’s new government in Dublin.

How did this happen? To recap briefly, a general election was held on February 8. The vote was split roughly in quarters—one for left-wing/pro-unification party Sinn Féin and one each for traditional centrist parties Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael. The rest went to smaller parties and independents. After four-and-a-half months of posturing and negotiations, a government was formed on June 27. Fianna Fáil’s Micheál Martin heads the government until December 2022 after which Fine Gael’s Leo Varadkar will replace him as Taoiseach. The two also alternate as each other’s Tánaiste (deputy prime minister). The third member of the coalition is the Green Party, giving the government the solid bloc of votes needed for a stable majority.

How stable is it, though? No one seems particularly thrilled by this government. Perhaps die-hard Fianna Fáil partisans are, but their numbers shrank drastically after the 2011 election debacle when the party was punished roundly for its role in the country’s financial crash. Notably unhappy is the half of the electorate that voted for Sinn Féin, independents and other left-wing parties and who felt there had been a pretty clear mandate for change. Quite a few Green Party members also seemed unhappy, although in the end members did ratify the party’s participation in the government in surprisingly large numbers.

While the traditional way of looking at the country’s political division would be in terms of the left/right split, it might be clearer to see it as an urban/rural split. The Western People headline above was in reaction to the fact that, for the first time in yonks, the government’s voting cabinet included no TD (member of parliament) from west of the Shannon River. Westerners were particularly sensitive this time around because the government’s aggressive program for reducing Ireland’s carbon footprint, which was pushed hard by the Greens and, more importantly, mandated by the European Union. As mentioned here last time, as a nation less industrialized than other European ones, Ireland can only achieve this through sacrifices from vehicle owners and farmers. TDs in the Dublin area represent mostly people who never go near a farm and who have access to public transportation, while the West will be asked to undergo a radical change to its traditions and lifestyle.

The omission of a western cabinet minister did soon get rectified in classically Irish fashion. In what seemed like a political hit job, a story came out about the new agricultural minister having been caught for drink driving a few years ago at a road checkpoint after an All-Ireland football match. It further emerged that he had been driving on a learner’s permit up until the age of 47. That fellow (brother of the last previous Fianna Fáil Taoiseach, as it happens) was soon pushed out, freeing up a cabinet seat for a TD from County Mayo. This hasn’t placated the wary westerners much, and now it’s the Midlands complaining they no longer have a minister.

Rural/urban divides are common enough in world politics, and no more so in the United States. Non-urban voters in the U.S. have a bit more of an advantage than in most countries, though. Senate voting and the Electoral College give extra weight to states at the expense of the general population. It was a carefully crafted compromise in the Constitution to convince less populated states to stay in the Union and assure them that their interests would not be overridden by people in dense population centers. That old tension has not gone away. After all, that 18th-century compromise made possible the elections of George W. Bush and Donald Trump.

The looming question in both the U.S. and Ireland is what happens if and when people rural dwellers begin to feel that not only are their interests overridden but they themselves are under attack? We can only hope the various political systems will be up to the challenge.