"Down These Green Streets" is the latest port of call in an ongoing search for the meaning of
Celtic Noir as it has hit the headlines recently. This book, a collection of essays by practitioners in the genre,
is a very helpful guide to current trends in publishing worldwide, not just in Ireland.
There is much analysis of the split between "literature" and "popular" writing, or genre fiction as the latter
is so often called. There is mention of the effect that thirty years of "Troubles" has had on the collective
psyche of writers. Ongoing references insist that Irish writers see themselves as working on a wider canvas
than that afforded by a national literature and America is invoked constantly as a place, both real and imaginary,
where Irish people have found a voice.
I have to admit that most of the analysis is very far away from my own experience of reading.
Having studied French for years and having been compelled to read most of the Existentialist writing of the
post-WW2 generation, I finally took refuge in Proust and Colette. These writers operate on a more domestic
and psychological scale. They seem to be closer to my everyday lived reality and, for style combined with substance,
they are hard to beat.
Somehow "hard-boiled" has never had much allure for me. I think that people are kinder and more mis-directed
than crime writers would seem to admit. Real people blunder through life as best they can. Finding cause and effect,
meting out punishments that fit crimes, forming reasonable explanations for the human condition ... all these make noir fiction
a satisfying read. Ends are tied up securely, the reader can actually feel safe after the ordeals suffered by the protagonists.
This is not my lived experience...
2 comments:
Yeah, it's not mine either. But then I suppose that most of what else I read is not my lived experience which is part of the draw.
I've been dabbling in this book rather than reading straight through. I really enjoyed Arlene Hunt's article on Liam O'Flaherty, in part because not in the same league as Joyce, he seems to be motivated by many of the same impulses and conflicts. Also a similar amount of energy, although employed in different ways. I would like to read the shorter pieces of his she mentions. I saw the Informer once, but I think it would easily do with a rewatch or even a new reading.
Your comment kick started some thoughts on art and life.
Having lived through the "death of the novel" and the "death of the author" it's nice to see both continue to sit up and take notice.
Life is so mundane here at the moment that I actually enjoyed "Bloodland" by Alan Glynn for its drama and panache.
Have you read it?
The cross-cultural exchanges between Europe, Africa, the US and (fleetingly mentioned) China are very up to date.
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