Click on the headline to link to the "Literary Encyclopedia" entry for Irish-the American writer, James T.Farrell.
Recently I have begun to post entries under the headline- “Songs To While Away The Class Struggle By” and "Films To While Away The Class Struggle By"-that will include progressive and labor-oriented songs and films that might be of general interest to the radical public. I have decided to do the same for some books that may perk that same interest under the title in this entry’s headline. Markin
Book Review
The Young Manhood of Studs Lonigan, James T. Farrell, Random House, New York, 1934
Over the past several years, as part of re-evaluating the effect of my half-Irish diaspora heritage (on my mother's side) on the development of my leftist political consciousness I have read, and in some cases re-read, some of the major works of the Irish American experience. Of course, any such reading list includes tales from the pen of William Kennedy and his Albany sagas, most famously "Ironweed". And, naturally, as well the tales of that displaced Irishman, the recently departed Frank McCourt and his "Angela's Ashes", a story that is so close to the bone of my own "shanty" Irish diaspora upbringing that we are forever kindred spirits. That said, here to my mind is the "max daddy" of all the American disapora storytellers, James T. Farrell, and his now rightly famous trilogy, "Studs Lonigan" (hereafter, "Studs").
And in his storytelling of his people, the Chicago Irish, Farrell does not let us down. "Studs" is only marginally concerned with political issues, and then only of the bourgeois kind rampant amount the Irish in the early part of the 20th century when they were taking over local politics in a number of cities from their WASP guardians. However, he has hit so many "hot buttons" about "lace curtain" Irish sensibilities and the struggle against "shanty" Irishness that he, Kennedy, and McCourt could have easily compared notes for their respective works.
The story line for this second book of the trilogy is reflected in the headline to this entry, at least ironically. In the first book we leave our daydreaming, wise guy- affecting, just-hanging out with the guys "Studs" in his late teen years in the 1920s, a time when he is trying to figure out life's short-cut angles but, mainly, has, in fact, plenty of time for the corner boys. He works a little for old man Lonigan as a painter but, for the most part, he hangs around pool halls, speakeasies, and cat houses. Oh Studs dreams alright, or rather day dreams about being a great athlete, a war hero, a ladies' man, and the like but does not take step one to do anything about it. By the end of this second book it is clear that the struggle between his gentile "lace curtain" home life and his "shanty" ways that surfaced in the first book ("Young Lonigan") has tilted decisively toward the latter. "Studs" has, moreover, settled in as primarily a man of the neighborhood, the Irish neighborhood as it shifts in place in Southside Chicago with the migration of blacks, the hated 'n----rs', that appear as the main enemy to the narrow world view of the inhabitants of the Irish diaspora way of life then, and now. We'll pick up the story in the third book and see which ethos, in the end, wins the battle.
Note: Toward the end of the second book "Studs" and his cohorts attend a Catholic Church-sponsored mission. For those who have been through that process I need give no explanation but for those who have not this mission idea is to give one an extra chance to gain grace by attending meetings, ceremonies and the like over several days, usually conducted by an itinerant priest. Here the character is named Father Shannon and Farrell goes into great detail about the subject matter of his sermon at one night's session. That sermon exemplifies everything that the Roman Catholic Church stood for, and mainly still stands for: anti-abortion, anti-premarital sex; anti-marrying outside the religion; anti-raising the children outside of the religion; the necessity of avoiding about seven hundred sins, large and small; also alcohol, pool halls, rough talk, etc. Just about everything that "Studs" stands for in his young life. My point in making this note, however, is this: this sermon could have been delivered, and maybe was delivered, by some itinerant priest when I was young and went to such missions in the 1950s. Hey, they must go to school for that, right? If you can stand it, that sermon section alone is reason enough to read this book.
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