DOCSLIB.ORG

Belfast: the Far from Sublime City in Brian Moore's Early Novels

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Belfast: the Far from Sublime City in Brian Moore's Early Novels Technological University Dublin ARROW@TU Dublin Articles School of Business and Humanities 2001 Belfast: the Far from Sublime City in Brian Moore's Early Novels Eamon Maher Technological University Dublin, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://arrow.tudublin.ie/ittbus Part of the Modern Literature Commons Recommended Citation Maher, E. (2001). Belfast: the far from sublime city in Brian Moore's early novels. Studies: an Irish quarterly review, vol.90, no. 360 (Winter 2001), p. 422-431. This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the School of Business and Humanities at ARROW@TU Dublin. It has been accepted for inclusion in Articles by an authorized administrator of ARROW@TU Dublin. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 4.0 License Belfast: The Far from Sublime City in Brian Moore's Early Novels Author(s): Eamon Maher Source: Studies: An Irish Quarterly Review, Vol. 90, No. 360 (Winter, 2001), pp. 422-431 Published by: Irish Province of the Society of Jesus Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/30095508 . Accessed: 17/02/2014 04:43 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Irish Province of the Society of Jesus is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Studies: An Irish Quarterly Review. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 149.157.1.168 on Mon, 17 Feb 2014 04:43:01 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions "Belfast:The far from Sublime City in Brian Moore's early novels" "BELFAST: THE FAR FROM SUBLIME CITY IN BRIAN MOORE'S EARLY NOVELS." Ea600 Maher Thecity has beena sourceof inspirationfor many writers. Joyce's depictions of Dublinhave promptedmuch cultural tourism in ourcapital as the annual Bloomsdaycelebrations will attestto. New York,Paris, London, Madrid have all been describedboth positivelyand negativelyin numerousworks of fiction.Belfast has inevitablyhad her bards, few probablybetter known than the novelistBrian Moore (1921-1999), who wrote several novels set in places as far afieldas Canada,the US, France,South America and North Africa. It seemsto me, however,that most of Moore'sbest fictionwas set in Belfast. His views on the city havebeen well-documented in his radioand television interviews,where he commentson its repressive,sectarian nature, its resistanceto change,its immutability.He was born and rearedin Clifton Street,directly opposite the OrangeHall, and he thushad an excellent view of the statueof King Billy on his whitehorse, a symbolof the originsof the religiousconflict that has longbedeviled the history of this island.Moore, the nephewof Eoin McNeill,one of the foundersof the GaelicLeague and the manwho signedthe countermandingorder for the 1916 Rebellion,was part of an extremelyCatholic nationalisticfamily. By his own admission, however,he `lackedthe religioussense', and thus always felt uncomfortable in a city wherepeople take their religious allegiance so seriously.He hated the educationhe receivedat St. Malachy's,the diocesanschool where you were canedfor the slightestmisdemeanour, and he soon discoveredthat he hadno interestin becominga doctor,like his fatherand brothers before him. He achedto escapefrom Belfast and the SecondWorld War provided him withthe opportunity.He joined the British Ministry of WarTransport and his workbrought him to NorthAfrica, France and Italy. When he subsequently joinedthe UnitedNations, he was sent to Polandwhere his infatuationwith an olderlady promptedhim to headto Canada.He workedfor a few years with the 600treal Gazette.Then, afterthe break-upof his first marriage, Mooresettled in Californiawith his secondwife, Jean,and he spentthe rest of his life there. I mentionthese few biographicalfacts to illustratehow Moore visited and lived in manyplaces around the world.He was exposedto severalcultures andexperiences after he left Belfastaged 21. So he couldnot be describedas parochialin any senseof the term.He returnedregularly to Belfastto see his motherbut each time he visitedhis firstthoughts were how quicklyhe could leave again withoutinsulting his family. Belfast, a city he loathed,was neverthelessthe place wherehe decidedto situatehis earlyfiction. I will attemptto illustratehow the city's landscapeand architecture,its sights, 422 This content downloaded from 149.157.1.168 on Mon, 17 Feb 2014 04:43:01 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions Studies Volume 90 Number360 soundsand smells were imbedded in theauthor's consciousness. Moore liked to quotethe Frenchwriter and Nobel Prizewinner, Francois Mauriac, who saidthat for the novelist the doorcloses at twenty,by whichhe meantthat the eventsof the firsttwenty years of life formthe basisof our futureconcerns and preoccupations.Belfast was whereMoore's artistictemperament was moulded even though, in `:..hewalked in a dull orderto nurturehis vocation,he was impelledto citywhere men made leave the city. In a passagefrom `The Expatriate 600ey theway Writer'Moore describes a departurefrom Belfast. charwomenwash Having boarded the ferry, which marks the f oors,dully, alone, at a slowmethodical embarkingon a new existence, the young " emigrantstrikes up a conversationwith a man pace who asks him what are his reasonsfor leaving Ireland: I'm leavinghome because I don'twant to be a doctorlike myfather andbrothers. Because I wantto be a writer.I wantto write...Perhaps that'sthe way a lot ofpeople becomewriters. They don't like the role they'replaying and writing seems a betterone.' In reallife, Mooredid not realiseat the timewhat the futureheld in storefor him.He hadno inklingthat he wouldend up as a writer.What he did know was thathe was suffocatingin Belfastand that he wantedto contributeto the war effort on the Allies' side. There was a sense in which the artistic temperamentwas suspectin the city he was leaving.Were he to havestayed, he wouldhave run the risk of slippinginto the same Catholicghetto that ensnaressome of his characters.Belfast may be the inspirationof most of Moore'sbest writingbut he could neverhave writtenabout it so forcibly, sometimesso cruelly,had he not left it. Therecan be no doubtthat the door closedfor him, as forMauriac, at twenty. TheLonely Passion of JudithHearne (1955 is a remarkablefirst novel. Mooreadmitted how conscioushe was of Joycewhen he beganto writethis book: I wantedto about own loss butdid not wishto risk *rite my offaith, adversecomparisons with him (Joyce by describingthe loss offaith in a youngIrishman... I decidedto writenot aboutan intellectual's loss but the loss in someonedevout, the sort offaith of of faith 2 of womanmy mother would have known, a `sodalitylady' Thechoice of heroinewas inspirational.Judith is thevictim of a domineering auntwho demandsthat she sacrificeher futureto carefor herwhen the old lady becomesan invalid.After the aunt'sdeath, Judith has lost whatever youthfulnessand charm she oncepossessed and, in addition,is in a precarious financialposition. The opening pages of thenovel see Judithmoving into new digs. She is a womanimbued with muchof the snobberyof her class and, 423 This content downloaded from 149.157.1.168 on Mon, 17 Feb 2014 04:43:01 AM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions "Belfast:The far from Sublime City in Brian Moore 's early novels" althoughshe doesn'tpossess much in termsof materialpossessions, she is acutelyaware of being somehowsuperior to her landladyand the other tenantsof the lodginghouse: Thestreet outsidewas a universitybywater, once a good residential area, whichhad lately beenreduced to the level of takingin paying guests.Miss Hearne stared at the housesopposite and thoughtof her aunt'sday when there were only private families in thisstreet, at least one maid to everyhouse, and dinnerwas at night,not at noon.All gone now and all thosepeople deadand all thehouses partitioned off intoflats 3. The settingclearly doesn't appeal to Judith.In her mind,it's just another exampleof how the city is faIlinginto social and moral decay. She is awareof the fact that she doesn'treally belong in Belfast,or anywhereelse for that matter.She is partof a worldand class that have all butdisappeared. This is why her prize possessionsare her aunt'spicture and the oleographof the SacredHeart, which she carefullyhangs up eachtime she movesdigs. These are the remindersof whatshe holdsmost dear:her familyand her religion. But neither gives her much comfort. She is desperateto experience companionship,love, adventureand is excitedby herfirst encounter with the brotherof her landlady,Mr. Madden,recently returned from the United States.She says to him:"I'm sure you findBelfast dull, after New York.My goodness,after all that excitement.It's so up-to-dateand everything,New York,I mean."(p.28). Maddendoes indeedfind Belfastdull. Whenwalking through the damp streetsof the Ulstercapital, he remembershow the Big Applehums with the businessof makingmillions. He thinks of the shows on Broadway,the wisecracksyou hear on the streetsand finds the contrastwith his present
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Observance Without Belief
    OBSERVANCE WITHOUT BELIEF David Staines 'RIAN MOORE has the distinction of being a writer with two nationalities, Canadian and Irish, though he now lives in California.1 While proud of his Canadian citizenship and his ten-year residence in Canada, where he wrote his first three novels, he acknowledges his primary debt to Ireland: "I'm an Irish writer in this way. I was brought up in Ireland, and Mauriac once said 'the door closes at twenty on a writer and that forms him.' So I am an Irish writer in that I was formed by Ireland, not by Canada." A crucial part of his Irish formation is the world of Irish Catholicism, a religion prominent throughout his fiction. "I'm interested in Catholicism in a non-religious way," he continues, "I'm inter- ested in the traditions that it sets up, and the conflicts."2 Born in Belfast of Catholic parents, Moore received a Catholic education of narrow religiosity. Like Stephen Dedalus of Joyce's Portrait of the Artist, he attended Catholic schools that perpetuated a rigorous and bigoted training, and this schooling stands behind the indictment of Saint Michan's College in The Feast of Lupercal and later novels. Like Dedalus, Moore rejected the indoctrina- tion of his Catholic education, though it did leave a powerful and lasting impres- sion upon him and his fiction : I felt, and I still feel, bitterly against the school system I was brought up on. It was a system of beating and teaching by rote, and when I saw other children and how bright they were able to become under American methods, it was around that time that I started to write Lupercal.
    [Show full text]
  • The Novel and the Short Story in Ireland
    The Novel and the Short Story in Ireland: Readership, Society and Fiction, 1922-1965. Thesis submitted in accordance with the requirements of the University of Liverpool for the degree of Doctor in Philosophy by Anthony Halpen April 2016 Anthony Halpen Institute of Irish Studies The University of Liverpool 27.03.2016 i ABSTRACT The Novel and the Short Story in Ireland: Readership, Society and Fiction, 1922-1965. Anthony Halpen, The Institute of Irish Studies, The University of Liverpool. This thesis considers the novel and the short story in the decades following the achievement of Irish independence from Britain in 1922. During these years, many Irish practitioners of the short story achieved both national and international acclaim, such that 'the Irish Short Story' was recognised as virtually a discrete genre. Writers and critics debated why Irish fiction-writers could have such success in the short story, but not similar success with their novels. Henry James had noticed a similar situation in the United States of America in the early nineteenth century. James decided the problem was that America's society was still forming - that the society was too 'thin' to support successful novel-writing. Irish writers and critics applied his arguments to the newly-independent Ireland, concluding that Irish society was indeed the explanation. Irish society was depicted as so unstructured and fragmented that it was inimical to the novel but nurtured the short story. Ireland was described variously: "broken and insecure" (Colm Tóibín), "often bigoted, cowardly, philistine and spiritually crippled" (John McGahern) and marked by "inward-looking stagnation" (Dermot Bolger).
    [Show full text]
  • Landscapes of Encounter: the Portrayal of Catholicism in the Novels of Brian Moore
    University of Calgary PRISM: University of Calgary's Digital Repository University of Calgary Press University of Calgary Press Open Access Books 2002 Landscapes of Encounter: The Portrayal of Catholicism in the Novels of Brian Moore Gearon, Liam University of Calgary Press Gearon, L. "Landscapes of Encounter: The Portrayal of Catholicism in the Novels of Brian Moore". University of Calgary Press, Calgary, Alberta, 2002. http://hdl.handle.net/1880/49343 book http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives 3.0 Unported Downloaded from PRISM: https://prism.ucalgary.ca University of Calgary Press www.uofcpress.com LANDSCAPES OF ENCOUNTER: THE PORTRAYAL OF CATHOLICISM IN THE NOVELS OF BRIAN MOORE by Liam Gearon ISBN 978-1-55238-663-7 THIS BOOK IS AN OPEN ACCESS E-BOOK. It is an electronic version of a book that can be purchased in physical form through any bookseller or on-line retailer, or from our distributors. Please support this open access publication by requesting that your university purchase a print copy of this book, or by purchasing a copy yourself. If you have any questions, please contact us at [email protected] Cover Art: The artwork on the cover of this book is not open access and falls under traditional copyright provisions; it cannot be reproduced in any way without written permission of the artists and their agents. The cover can be displayed as a complete cover image for the purposes of publicizing this work, but the artwork cannot be extracted from the context of the cover of this specific work without breaching the artist’s copyright.
    [Show full text]
  • Book Reviews
    Book Reviews Jo O'Donoghue. Brian Moore: A Critical Study. Montreal and King• ston: McGill-Queen's UP, 1991. pp. xix, 266. $39.95. One of the problems inherent in writing a critical book about a living author is that it can quickly be rendered out of date or incom• plete, especially when the subject of that study is such a prolific author as Brian Moore. Three earlier books on him (1969, 1974, 1981 ) suffered from that risk, but for the moment this present study is safe : it covers all of Moore's sixteen major novels, from Judith Hearne (1955) to Lies of Silence (1990), but if his past record continues, another novel is almost certain to appear in the next year or so. Nevertheless, this latest study is a thorough and perceptive one, and O'Donoghue, with her Irish and (I believe) Catholic back• ground, brings insights to her reading of Moore that any new novels by him should not seriously invalidate. It is predicated on a thesis that will not necessarily find support from all readers (that Moore's early hostility to religion and Catholicism has been replaced by his view that spiritual faith is the highest kind there is), and one can accuse her of choosing novels too selectively to support this argument, but on the whole she presents her case convincingly and compels us to consider connections among Moore's novels that we might have missed. First, however, there are a few matters to get out of the way, especially regarding the book's overall structure.
    [Show full text]
  • The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne 10:30 AM – 12:30 PM (1955) Norton Room
    Brian Moore Book Discussion 1921- 1999 Irish Cultural Center October 28 The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne 10:30 AM – 12:30 PM (1955) Norton Room Discussion Guide: Brian Moore’s life and career spanned much of the 20th century and reflected a familiar pattern for Irish writers, one of self-imposed exile, first to Canada and then to southern California. Born into a Belfast Catholic family, Moore’s experiences also include two familiar themes, Irish nationalism and questions of faith. His works (twenty novels--plus others under pen names) reflect diversity in subject and style that few writers can claim. Patricia Craig of The Irish Times asserts that he is a “writer who refused to be typecast.” A novelist popular with the general readers, Moore seems to resist contemporary trends. Again I quote Craig: “Though he started off as a Joyce enthusiast, and remained one all his life, Brian Moore might be placed at the opposite extreme from Joyce, and indeed from the whole modernist tradition with its denigration of plot-making as something a bit bourgeois and passé” (The Irish Times, January 16, 1999). ►John Wilson Foster, in Forces and Themes in Ulster Fiction (1974), says that “The Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne (1955) is perhaps the best novel to come out of Northern Ireland.” After your initial reading, consider what aspects of this novel you find worthy of such praise. ►Describe Judith Hearne (appearance, behaviors, beliefs, desires). What can you say about the people she comes in contact with? Clearly one theme of the novel relates to loss of faith, but what circumstances (gender, class, and rearing) are operating in this psychological portrayal of a woman in Belfast? ►In Brian Moore: A Critical Study (1991), Jo O’Donoghue speaks about Moore’s techniques: As a novelist, Brian Moore always creates a plausible world by the techniques he employs.
    [Show full text]
  • Reading Brian Moore Reading James Joyce Patrick Hicks
    The Fourth Master: Reading Brian Moore Reading James Joyce Patrick Hicks In the opening chapter of James Joyce’s masterpiece, Ulysses (1922), Stephen Dedalus speaks with Haines, that “ponderous Saxon,” who is an ethnologist of the Irish language studying at Oxford (4). While standing atop Martello Tower, Dedalus muses, more to himself than to Haines, that he is the servant of three masters: the imperial British state, the holy Roman catholic and apostolic church, and colonial Ireland (17). For Dedalus, these three masters stifl e his creativity and frustrate his understanding of what it means to be a writer. In a similar manner, Brian Moore deeply admired James Joyce but, like other writers of his generation who were grappling with Joyce’s ghost, he also needed to escape from the long shadow of this powerful ‘fourth master’. Much of Irish fi ction in the latter twentieth-century echoes with Joyce, and this is particularly true of the early novels that Brian Moore wrote in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Moore, who grew up in Northern Ireland, wrote twenty novels before his sudden death in 1999, and he is best known for such work as e Lonely Passion of Judith Hearne (1955), e Emperor of Ice-Cream (1965), Catholics (1972), Cold Heaven (1983), Black Robe (1985), and his fi nal novel, e Magician’s Wife (1997). An uncommonly prodigious writer, Moore also wrote a number of short stories, a brief documen- tary on Canada, and several screenplays, most notably Torn Curtain for Alfred Hitchcock. As a young man Moore served in the Air Raid Precautions (ARP) in Belfast during the Blitz and then he joined the British Ministry of War Transport.
    [Show full text]
  • Brian Moore's Special Cachet : a Study in Characterization
    BRIAN MOORE'S SPECIAL CACHET : A STUDY IN CHARACTERIZATION by Irene Brenda Jeffery B.A., University of British Columbia , 1960 A THESIS SUBMITTED IN PARTIAL FULFILMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF MASTER OF ARTS in the Department of English We accept this thesis as conforming to the required standard THE UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA May, 1972' In presenting this thesis in partial fulfilment of the requirements for an advanced degree at the University of British Columbia, I agree that the Library shall make it freely available for reference and study. I further agree that permission for extensive copying of this thesis for scholarly purposes may be granted by the Head of my Department or by his representatives. It is understood that copying or publication of this thesis for financial gain shall not be allowed without my written permission. Department The University of British Columbia Vancouver 8, Canada Date ^["j V) 191%. ABSTRACT The purpose of this study, is to establish the thesis that Brian Moore's predominant concern with the characterization of his individual protagonists influences both the form and content of his first seven novels. Chapters I and II discuss the effect of Moore's interest in character on the structural elements of plot and point of view. Chapter I describes the typical Moore plot which traces the gradual transformation of the character of the protagonist as the result of a series of disillusioning events which climax in a moment of revised self-recognition. Thus, plot is operative in determining character. The most striking aspect of Moore's narrative technique, discussed in Chapter II, is his accomplished mixing of first and third-person narration.
    [Show full text]
  • A Study of Brian Moore's Hallucinatory Technique in Fergus
    Journal of Literature, Languages and Linguistics www.iiste.org ISSN 2422-8435 An International Peer-reviewed Journal Vol.17, 2015 A Study of Brian Moore’s Hallucinatory Technique in Fergus Pro . Dr. Ekbal Al-Jabbari Zarqa University Faculty of Arts Department of English Language and Literature Abstract Hallucinatory realism is a term that has been used in connection with the concept of magical realism in literature . Hallucinatory realism is more specific. I is defined as " a dream-state , where the imaginary universe seems concrete and believable" . Fergus (1970) is one of Brian Moore's novels characterized by innovation in the style of narration and plot structure . From Moore 's perspective , the traditional realistic approach and the modern consciousness method appear to be insufficient for presenting the full dimensions of the crises of an artist-hero in exile . Accordingly, he adopts the hallucinatory technique or Hallucinatory realism in the novel in which the actual world of the hero is inhabited by visiting ghosts and spirits of dead people from his past life in Ireland. The past impinges on the suffocating present not in forms of actual remembrances or recollections , but through the protagonist's imaginative recreation of it in terms of hallucination , which in turn highlights the true nature of the sacrifices in the artist's aesthetic talents and past heritage for the media, fame and publicity . Keywords: Artist–Hero Conflict , Mass–Media , Hallucinatory Realism, Metaphysical Journey to the Past, Self- Redemption . Introduction Hallucinatory realism is a term that has been used in connection with the concept of magical realism in literature Hallucinatory realism is more specific .
    [Show full text]
  • Phd Submission Barry Mcauley
    The Trouble with Hindsight Comparing depictions of pre-Troubles Northern Ireland in pre-1968 and post-1968 fiction Barry Joseph McAuley – August 2013 A submission presented in partial fulfilment of requirements of The University of South Wales for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy by Portfolio Abstract In this paper, I examine how hindsight concerning significant historical events affects the writing process, with particular reference to the case of the Troubles in Northern Ireland. I explore fictional depictions of Northern Ireland before the Troubles (pre-1968) and compare how novels which were written in that era (and therefore without hindsight) compare with novels written after the Troubles began. I go on to discuss my own attempts at dealing with the weight of hindsight in writing two novels set in Northern Ireland, the first of which, Black Dog, is a post-Troubles novel, while the second, Turquoise Car, is a pre-Troubles novel. I have found that novels written before the Troubles are less self-conscious with regard to depicting sectarian tension in Northern Ireland, with some novels featuring strong (unrestrained) depictions, and other novels choosing to exclude the topic. In novels written post-Troubles, i.e. those with a retrospective viewpoint, I have found that both the writing and the reading of the novel appears heavily weighted with the burden of hindsight, such that the authenticity of naturalistic1, everyday elements is, in some cases, questionable. I have concluded that writing naturalistic fiction about pre-Troubles Northern Ireland demands careful consideration of how hindsight can skew or constrain the work, and that it is not possible to exclude sectarian depictions in a way which was possible for writers writing before the Troubles.
    [Show full text]
  • Notes on Brian Moore's Transition to North America
    Colby Quarterly Volume 31 Issue 1 March Article 7 March 1995 "Home, A Moscow of the Mind": Notes on Brian Moore's Transition to North America Denis Sampson Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.colby.edu/cq Recommended Citation Colby Quarterly, Volume 31, no.1, March 1995, p.46-54 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by Digital Commons @ Colby. It has been accepted for inclusion in Colby Quarterly by an authorized editor of Digital Commons @ Colby. Sampson: "Home, A Moscow of the Mind": Notes on Brian Moore's Transition t "Home, A Moscow ofthe Mind": Notes on Brian Moore's Transition to North America by DENIS SAMPSON "I HAVE ESCAPED FROM the provincial mediocrity of my native land and now live, in exile, in the Rome ofourday." Soreflects BrendanTierney, aspiring Irish novelist in New York City, early in Brian Moore's An Answerfrom Limbo (1962). The clean and deeply ironic simplicity of the declaration prepares the reader for the complex and ugly narrative ofdegradation which follows, and for the lifelong investigation which Brian Moore has undertaken into the cost of Iiving as an artist in the global village. On the first page ofthe novel, Tierney recalls a letterfrom his mother, "aletter which carried me back, not to the Ireland she wrote of, butto Home, that Moscow ofmy mind, forever shut in from the rest ofthe world; forever shut out" (AL, 5). Critics have praised this novel for its acute portrayal ofthe egocentric artist who abandons wife, mother, children and friends for his work.
    [Show full text]
  • Religious Practice Bereft of Faith
    Technological University Dublin ARROW@TU Dublin Articles School of Business and Humanities 1999-9 Religious Practice Bereft of Faith Eamon Maher Technological University Dublin, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://arrow.tudublin.ie/ittbus Recommended Citation Maher, E., ''Religious Practice Bereft of Faith'',Doctrine and Life, Vol. 49, No. 7, pp. 386-397, September 1999 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the School of Business and Humanities at ARROW@TU Dublin. It has been accepted for inclusion in Articles by an authorized administrator of ARROW@TU Dublin. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected]. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 4.0 License Religious Practice Bereft of Faith EAMON MAHER Brian Moore (1921-1999) is an Irish novelist who is known to a wide international audience and admired by the majority of the Irish reading public. When someone is described by Graham Greene, as Moore was, as being 'My favourite living novelist', he deserves to be taken seriously. In many ways, however, Moore viewed this comment as a millstone around his neck and felt pres­ surised to write in a way that would mark him as different from Greene. His experiments with various literary genres, ranging from the thriller to the psychological novel, to the historical novel, remind one of Greene, but when it comes to his treatment of Catholicism, he is very different. Greene had all the fervour of the convert and deals dramatically with crises of faith in novels like The Power and the Glory ( 1940) and The Heart of the Matter ( 1948).
    [Show full text]
  • Landscapes of Encounter: the Portrayal of Catholicism in the Novels of Brian Moore
    University of Calgary PRISM: University of Calgary's Digital Repository University of Calgary Press University of Calgary Press Open Access Books 2002 Landscapes of Encounter: The Portrayal of Catholicism in the Novels of Brian Moore Gearon, Liam University of Calgary Press Gearon, L. "Landscapes of Encounter: The Portrayal of Catholicism in the Novels of Brian Moore". University of Calgary Press, Calgary, Alberta, 2002. http://hdl.handle.net/1880/49343 book http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/ Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives 3.0 Unported Downloaded from PRISM: https://prism.ucalgary.ca University of Calgary Press www.uofcpress.com LANDSCAPES OF ENCOUNTER: THE PORTRAYAL OF CATHOLICISM IN THE NOVELS OF BRIAN MOORE by Liam Gearon ISBN 978-1-55238-663-7 THIS BOOK IS AN OPEN ACCESS E-BOOK. It is an electronic version of a book that can be purchased in physical form through any bookseller or on-line retailer, or from our distributors. Please support this open access publication by requesting that your university purchase a print copy of this book, or by purchasing a copy yourself. If you have any questions, please contact us at [email protected] Cover Art: The artwork on the cover of this book is not open access and falls under traditional copyright provisions; it cannot be reproduced in any way without written permission of the artists and their agents. The cover can be displayed as a complete cover image for the purposes of publicizing this work, but the artwork cannot be extracted from the context of the cover of this specific work without breaching the artist’s copyright.
    [Show full text]