FICTION.
A MUNSTER TWILIGHT.* Ten word " twilight " has been heard pretty frequently of late in connexion with the Celtic Renaissance, but Mr. Corkery's stories are
not,save in one instance, notable for this crepuscular quality, so much as for the denser gloom which pervades the greatdr part cl modern Russian fiction. Whether ho has been influenced by the study of Gorky and others of this violently depressing school of realists we cannot say. It may be merely an unconscious convergence, but the resemblance is sufficiently striking. The characters with few exceptions belong to the poor or submerged classes, dwellers in tenement-houses or frequenters of cheap lodging-houses in Irish towns as yet unequipped with cheap entertainments and unenlivened by the dazzle of the cinema. Politics do not enter into the book, but the absence of this element does not make for peace or happiness. Mr. Corkery has little use for happy endings ; many of his stories end even more gloomily than they begin. His characters are too fast bound by circumstance to emerge into a serener air. The atmosphere is generally one of squalor, the emotion is violent, and the whole is rounded off with death, disaster, or despair. But in this somewhat dismal desert of unhappiness there are a few welcome oases. Mr. Corkcry can record the charities as well as the torments of the submerged, and there is an exquisite study of a poor old man who had a passion for collecting cheap relics and pictures of saints, which he then sold to assist his still poorer neighbours. On the very morrow of the sale he began saving up his odd pence and half- pence to buy back his treasures :- "There was a Vacant space on his mantelpiece, another on his window- sill (how lovely the painted statue used to look there among the green. leaved geraniums when the sun shone in !) ; the worst gap of all, however, was the huge space of clean wall-paper where the picture had hung. Because of these blank spaces, the room looked upset, unfurnished. But he was a saint as well as a child ' • somehow his savings, pinch as he would, refused to mount up. The fact is, money would burn a hole in his pocket. How could he keep a grip on it if he saw a blind man's hand stretched out to the callous passers-by, or a hungry-looking boy staring in at a shop window ? Again and again he had to begin anew. One night in bed he reckoned up with some excitement that twelve months would soon have gone by. And, as luck had it, a few days afterwards ho chanced to hear a powerful sermon on the precious ointment that Magdalen had poured upon our Lord's feet, wasting money that might be devoted to charity, as the preacher said, throwing great scorn on the wisdom of the world into his enunciation of these words. Yea, the old man felt all that sermon come home to him, every phrase. Cost what it would, the end of the twelve mouths would see him with all his treasures gathered and housed once more within his attic under the slates. On the anniversary of the sale ho rose quite early, heard Mass, and set off in much uncertainty to gather his treasures. Ho almost fell down when it suddenly struck him that they might have frequently changed owners since his parting with them, and that he might after all never gather them together again. He came in and went up the stairs at one o'clock in the day. Mrs. Mehigan ' he called, as he passed her door (she was an old bed-ridden woman).— Yes, what is it I I have wan of them—the angel' At five o'clock lie passed up again. ' Mrs. Mehigan l Mrs. Mehigan ! Yes.'— 'I've another—St. Anthony.' He passed up a third time ; it was now about eight o'clock- He didn't speak. Mrs. Mehigan listened to his steps, how tired ho seemed, going up to his room ! She called out : Have you the last wan 1— No.' She thought 'twos a gasp ; by way of sympathy she said Oh, dear.'—' But I'm on the track of it,' he answered, quite brightly. He went out again. Tho whole house was dark, its many inhabitants snoring, when ho was heard struggling up the stairs once more, almost as a drunken man would, falling from side to side, and missing his steps, it seemed. The next morning Mrs. Phelan came into Mrs. Mehigan's room. She believed, she said, the Saint hadn't got the last one after all. Mrs. Mehigan answered that God was good. Go up and see,' she said. Mrs. Phelan went up, knocked, and got no reply. She came hack to Mrs. Mehigan. He's fast asleep ; I didn't knock very loud, I only tapped at the door ; 'tie how he's exhausted entirely:— I'm sure he had something in his arms, ho nearly fell against that door as he went up.' After some time Mrs. Phelan was sent up again. Mrs. Mehigan heard her knocking once, twice, thrice. Then she came down, as white as a sheet. ' Go out for Father Maher, child,' said Mrs. Mehigan. They found the Saint sitting on the floor, an unfinished bowl of bread and milk between his legs; 9 I jfallger Ttrtiigl.1, I) Daniel Cerkery. Dublin : The Talbot Press. Vs nets'
opposite his now-cold eyes was his Renaissance Madonna, it stood propped against the edge of the bed ; guarding it on the right was St. Anthony, on the left the chinaware angel, its font full of holy water. The candle that had lighted his treasures for him had burnt out. Mrs. Phelan • says when first she entered the room there was the smell of lovely flowers. Mrs. Mehigan says she heard far-away singing in the dead of night. In any case it is pleasant to think how sweet the old man's thoughts must have been as his eyes began to close for ever. Not far-away music nor newly-gathered flowers would be so sweet."
Happily there is more of this quality in the latter half of the book. Mr. Corkery has put nearly all his gloom in the van, a method to be deprecated on prudential grounds, for while it may impress the critic who admires strong meat, it is apt to choke off the plain and gentle reader, especially at the present time. But we recommend the reader to persevere, for ho will be rewarded. The atmosphere lightens, the " twilight " is no longer oppressive, and the series of sketches entitled "Tho Cobbler's Den " introduce us to a delightful group of characters ; the old cobbler himself, the blind man, and Maggie Maw, a woman who was either " dead or blazing "—quarrelsome, argumentative, but yet kind at heart, and with a real genius for storytelling as well as a profound enjoyment in the exercise of her art. Her story of the great flood, with the interruptions of the cobbler and the blind man and the cobbler'e final outburst of incredulity on her exit—" You couldn't believe daylight from that wan"—and the tragi-comic episode of the heiress—an old applewoman who was left a small fortune by a brother in America, but lost it all as well as half her wits in litigation—reveal gifts of humour, delicacy, and tenderness which compel admiration and inspire high hopes of future work from Mr. Corkery's pen. We trust, however, that it will be more in the vein of Kuprin than of Gorky.
Previous page
