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The Politics of Northern Ireland (2008)

Catholics/nationalists identify with the Republic of Ireland whereas the Protestant/unionist

community looks to Britain as their homeland, wanting Northern Ireland to be maintained

within the United Kingdom.

The concept of identity is important when it comes to ethnic groups and their self-

determination. The national identity of a group is defined by ethnicity. An ethnic group is one in which

its ethnic members have common descend, culture, language and religion which serve as the

demarcations od a given community. The members of the ethnic group share a common heritage and

memories of past events as well as similar aspirations for their future. Also, the group must identify

itself as a united, distinct group and must be recognised by other groups in this way.

(p. 23).

The unionists sense of Britishness is expressed through social and cultural activities (the

Orange parades and commemoration of WWI AND WWII which demonstrate their loyalty to the

British state and the Crown). The nationalist identity focuses on the Gaelic Athletic Association

and the Irish language. The problem is that the identity of an ethnic group must be recognized by

other ethic groups. Unionist culture and collective identity are problematic to the extent that

their sense of Britishness requires some recognition and acknowledgement of this from the

British people and the British state. But since this recognition and affirmation is not forthcoming,

this leaves the Ulster unionist identity unstable and unsure.1(John Barry)

But the nationalist/unionist dichotomy is somewhat over-simplified, since not everyone in

Northern Ireland identifies themselves as unionist or nationalist.

Town of Shadows: Representations of Belfast in Recent Fiction

Initially born as a British settlement, Belfast developed as a substantial settlement after the

17th

century and was an important commercial and industrial centre in the 18th

and the 19th

centuries. Despite this, between about 1800 and 1950 Belfast rarely appears in the works of

writers associated with it, maybe because they had little to say about it. Until recently, the city

hasnt played any major role in the Irish culture. John Hewitt points out that in the works of

Belfast poets of the last 19th

and early 20th

century there was not a word about where they lived

and the people they lived among2. Moreover, in the fiction up to 1910, Hewitt can identify only

two novels with a Belfast setting.

1Joanne McEvoy; The Politics of Northern Ireland, Edinburgh: Edingurgh University Press, 2008, p.22.

2P. 142. John Hewitt, The Northern Athens and After, Belfast: The Making of the City, pp. 71-82.

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Belfast as gothic locale - urban corruption vs. rural innocence

The city in the work of a whole range of Irish writers,became the focus of corruptionand impurity, set against the innocence and simplicity of the peasant. (Fintan OToole,

Island of Saints and Silicon: Literature and Social Change in Contemporary Ireland,

Cultural Contexts and Literary Idioms in Contemporary Irish Literature, p. 23)

In the last decades Belfast started to be rendered in literary creations. This tendency of

exploring the city life has been called the revival of Northern writing. The dominance of the rural

in Northern Irish and Irish culture started to decline due to the social, economic, cultural and

political changes in the last 60 years. The principal changes would be: the growth of Belfast, the

consequences of more widespread educational opportunities, the emergence of a securely city-

based and educated audience for writing about the city and the development of broadcasting and

electronic technologies. John Wilson Foster has argued that there is no real urban consciousnessin Ireland (1991). Still, there are novels in which the Irish culture is developing an urban

consciousness, and Ripley Bogle is one of them, if not something more. I think it is something

more than ifIconsider Fintan OTootles claim about the Irish urban writing. I dont remember

many episodes in Robert McLiam Wilsons book that happened indoors. Ripley describes the

streets of London. He admits that the vast outdoors is my house and hall. Im an exterior expert.

Im the Prince of Pavements, Im the Parkbench King3. Furthermore, Ripley doesnt seem like

the character who would appreciate country qualities, such as strong loyalty to family and

social groups or of firm attachment to principle.

There are many literary creations in which Belfast has been represented as a place ofconflict, as a battlefield dominated by its Troubles, by danger and violence. According to

Eamonn Hughes, the image of Blefast as mad, bad and dangerous is an exaggerated version of

itself and is derived from a religiously-based distrust of the urban as Gothic, stricken and

sinful4. In one of the first appearances of Blefast in recent fiction, the city is confusing and too

complex for an old countryman and defeats him to the point of death (DecemberBride, by Sam

Hanna Bell, 1951). In Robert McLiam Wilsons Ripley Bogle, the narrator blames Belfast of

thickening the body and the brains and chasing the soul away. He adds: Belfast shouldnt be

allowed to get away with this kind of thing. Belfast has to be stopped. Its time will come .5This

urge for an inevitable destruction of Belfast is also evident in Mary Costellos Titanic Townor

Gavin Bukes The Emperor of Ice-Cream.

Ripley Bogle is Robert McLiam Wilsons first novel, written in his early twenties and was

published in 1989. The novel opens in London, on the eve of the narrators 22nd

birthday. Ripley

3Ripley Bogle, p. 239.

4P, 147.

5Ripley Bogle, p. 37.

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is set in the 1980s and is currently homeless in London . He describes the world of London

streets as he recollects events from his own life up until the present. The images of a gloomy,

rainy and dark London alternate with the main episodes from Ripleys life. There are four

chapters, and each one begins with a depiction of a different location in London, and then

continues with a memory or a tramp anecdote (the episode with the charity meal, or the one with

the fight). For this book, the author was awarded the Rooney Prize and the Irish Book Award,

and has been shortlisted for the Whitbread Award. Ripley Bogle has autobiographical elements:

the writer, just like the narrator, was born and schooled in Belfast. He proceeded to Cambridge,

but left before taking a degree.6He was also homeless for some time. The book reminded me of

Knut Hamsuns Hunger, because this is also an autobiographical novel, and moreover hunger

can be seen as a character in the book. Ripley also talks about hunger like it is a person, and in

both novels the sensation of cold and other sufferings are depicted in detail. Moreover, both main

characters are walking almost all the time, they are intelligent and seem to possess a strong ego.

But in Ripley Bogle, not only the hunger is personified, but also the city.

As a boy, the narrator witnessed episodes of extreme violence (like the tar-and-feathering

of Mary or other executions and punishment beatings). Ripley says: For me, thebeginning was

Internment Night7. The violence is somehow reflected in the vulgarity of his language. Ripley

alternates a pretentious tone with profanity (vulgaritate) and irony. The narrative mode is mainly

in first-person, but we can also detect third-person narrative fragments. Ripley doesnt stop here.

Throughout the novel we find an imaginary dialogue with Orwell and Dickens, some dark

humored songs and even a dramatic text. Its like the narrator couldnt decide what to use. He

plays with the language and with the narrative. Sometimes he addresses directly to the reader,

asking him/her for a favour or even mentioning the pages that are left for him/her to read.*

The book challenges the very notion of Irishness itself and is a direct assault on

nationalism and cultural nostalgia in general. Even though the city is seen as a dark or

labyrinthine place dominated by conflicts, there is no wish to present the rural life as a better

alternative. Maybe as readers we expect from the Irish main character to be good-hearted, folksy,

to love Ireland and his family, to appreciate the countryside more than the city, and to be a

reliable source of information. Ripley does none of these things. In the beginning of the novel,

the narrator says: I am twenty-one years old, my name is Ripley Bogle and my occupations are

starving, freezing and weeping histerically(p. 8). Despite this, he sees himself as an intelligent

and handsome young man. He compares himself with the Queen, Dickens and Orwell and feels

that he doesnt belong to the tramp community. He has always been the outsider, even as achild. He has done some horrible things, and we cant say that he is very friendly with other

people. He despises his parents (he often uses the words my deranged mother), and is not a

patriot. Moreover, he is unreliable. He lies. This is hard to accept for me as a reader. At the end

of the book, when he confessed that he lied about three things, I started to question the whole

6Norman Vance, Irish Literature Since 1800, Pearson Education Limited, 2002, p. 286.

7Ripley Bogle, p.32.

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book. Are all the episodes true, especially the ones linked with the Troubles? Even though the

book is allowing us to peek into the Troubles of the Northern Ireland, Ripley doesnt seem

interested in politics. He focuses more on the effects of the Troubles.

Bibliography(and other sources)

Herr, Cheryl; The Erotics of Irishness , Critical Inquiry, Vol. 17, No. 1, 1990, pp. 1-34. Hughes, Eamonn; Town of Shadows: Representations of Belfast in Recent Fiction,

Religion & Literature, Vol. 28, No. 2/3, 1996, pp. 141-160.

Massie, Sonja; The Complete Idiots Guide toIrish History and Culture, New York:Pearson Education Company, 1999.

McEvoy, Joanne; The Politics of Northern Ireland, Edinburgh: Edingurgh UniversityPress, 2008.

Vance, Norman;Irish Literature Since 1800, Pearson Education Limited, 2002. http://thelitpub.com/featured-books/ripley-bogle/(11.12.2013) http://www.readinggroupguides.com/guides_R/ripley_bogle2.asp(11.12.2013)

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