Джон МакГерн: Жизнь и творчество ирландского писателя

Irish writer

John McGahern (12 November 1934 – 30 March 2006) was an Irish writer and novelist. He is regarded as one of the most important writers of the latter half of the twentieth century. Known for the detailed dissection of Irish life found in works such as The Barracks, The Dark and Amongst Women, he was hailed by The Observer as "the greatest living Irish novelist" and in its obituary The Guardian described him as "arguably the most important Irish novelist since Samuel Beckett".

Born in Dublin in the then Irish Free State, John McGahern was initially raised at Corramahon, a townland located just over a mile east north east from the small town of Ballinamore in the south east of County Leitrim. The eldest of seven (two sons and five daughters), he was raised alongside his siblings on the small farm at Corramahon. Susan and her family were local, the McManus family home being in the townland of Drumderg, right beside the townland of Corraleehan, a few miles north of Ballinamore. Drumderg townland is right beside County Cavan, with the county boundary between County Leitrim and County Cavan, and, therefore, the provincial boundary between Connacht and Ulster, running along the edge of the townland, Drumderg being on the Leitrim side of the county boundary. Sergeant Frank McGahern first met the then Susan McManus in 1924 in Ballinamore, when he was posted there, just after the Irish Civil War, as a garda with An Garda Síochána; she was working in the town as a primary school teacher at the time. Following her graduation, she had returned to her native South Leitrim. Frank and Susan finally married at St. Bridget's Church at Corraleehan (also known as Corraleehan Chapel), near Ballinamore, in August 1932. Sgt. McGahern was quite a violent man, being physically abusive to his children. in Drumcondra where he trained to be a teacher. Upon graduation he began his career as a primary school teacher at Scoil Eoin Báiste (Belgrove) primary school in Clontarf where, for a period, he taught the academic Declan Kiberd. He returned to third level education in University College Dublin where he graduated in 1957. He was first published by the London literary and arts review, X, which published in 1961 an extract from his first – abandoned – novel, The End or Beginning of Love. McGahern married his first wife, Finnish born Annikki Laaksi, in 1965 and in the same year published his second novel, The Dark which was banned by the Irish Censorship Board for its alleged pornographic content along with its implied sexual abuse by the protagonist's father. Due to the controversy which was stirred by the book's publication, McGahern was dismissed from his teaching post and forced to move to England where he worked in a variety of jobs, including on building sites, before returning to Ireland to live and work on a small farm that he bought near Fenagh, a village near Ballinamore, in the south east of County Leitrim. The farm was located in the townland of Aughaboneill, just south of Foxfield and a short distance south west of Fenagh. McGahern divorced in 1969, and married Madeline Green in 1973.

McGahern's six novels, drawing inspiration from personal life experience, detail the trials of developing a sense of self in mid twentieth century Ireland.

His first published novel, The Barracks (1963), chronicles the life of the barracks' Garda sergeant's second wife, Elizabeth Reegan, who is in declining health due to cancer. The Barracks was adapted for the stage in 1969 by Hugh Leonard. His second book, The Dark (1965), tracks the progression of a young boy as he moves through the education system in rural Ireland. The main character, young Mahoney, while maintaining his academic prowess, experiences a strained relationship with his father, old Mahoney – who beats him and the other children – as well as indecision about what to do with his life after secondary school. Young Mahoney's attitude towards his father evolves over the large timespan covered within the novel from fear and hatred towards greater acceptance. Note: The Barracks and The Dark came from McGahern's re writing of his first, unpublished, novel, The End or Beginning of Love.

The next novel, The Leavetaking (1975), introduces the reader to Patrick Moran, a young schoolteacher in Dublin. The novel is set during his last day in the school. He will be formally fired that night for having married a divorced non Catholic woman during a leave of absence year. The novel is divided into two parts: both of which are essentially flashbacks. Part 1 covers the teacher's childhood up to the moment of his mother's death. Like McGahern himself, Patrick had promised his mother that he would become a priest and, as he is unable or unwilling to do so, instead becomes a schoolteacher (often referred to as "the second priesthood" in mid twentieth century Ireland). Part 2 flashes back to how he came to meet his wife, how exactly the church authorities fired him, and his ultimate dismissal by the Catholic Church authorities, the formal authority within the vast majority of primary schools on the island of Ireland at the time. The book is a close reflection on McGahern's own experience of being dismissed from his teaching post in the early 1960s for much the same reasons as Patrick Moran, as well as the scandal caused by his second book, The Dark, for its many sexual references. The Pornographer (published in 1979) details the life of the novel's protagonist who lives in Dublin and writes pornography for a living. He begins a sexual relationship with a young woman called Josephine, and when Josephine subsequently becomes pregnant, the "pornographer" voices his contempt towards the birth of the baby, and indeed his relationship with the child's mother. As with McGahern's previous novel, this work treats the subject of death by cancer – the protagonist's aunt in this case is dying in hospital – as well as visits to rural Ireland.

His fifth, and perhaps McGahern's best known, novel is Amongst Women (1990), which marks a return to the North Roscommon/South Leitrim setting after two Dublin/London books. It details the story of Michael Moran, an IRA veteran of the Irish War of Independence and the Irish Civil War, who now dominates his family in the unforgiving farmlands surrounding Mohill in the south of County Leitrim. The book shows a detailed and understanding portrayal of a hardened, and unapologetically idealistic, protagonist in the figure of an ageing Moran. An ex IRA commander, Moran detests the "small minded gangsters" who now run the country for which he fought. Though Moran's presence surely dominates the novel, the positive attributes of his stern moralism and sense of self worth are passed on to his children, who become successful adults (both emotionally and financially) in both Dublin and London alike. Once again, it seems to fit into a sequence, with the progressive male character most closely reflected by Luke, who left home, emigrated to London, and refuses to get close to his father again. One may view McGahern's portrayal of the Moran household as the house he left behind with the remaining kids being brought up by his father, his father's remarriage, and his young brother's struggles with his father and school. In 2015, The Guardian listed Amongst Women as 97 in its list of the 100 best novels. His final novel, That They May Face the Rising Sun, which was published in 2002 (published in the United States as By the Lake), is a portrait of a year in the life of a rural lakeside community. The novel explores the meaning of prosaic lives and life in (a now past life) in rural Ireland. He said "the ordinary fascinates me" and "the ordinary is the most precious thing in life". The main characters have – just like McGahern and his wife – returned from London to live on a farm. Most of the violence of the father figure has disappeared now, and life in the country seems much more relaxed and prosperous than in The Dark or Amongst Women, as McGahern now writes in a twenty first century Ireland.

McGahern is also considered a master of the Irish tradition of the short story. Several collections were published as well as Love of the World, a collection of non fiction essays. His autobiography, Memoir (All Will be Well: a Memoir in the US), was published in 2005 a year before his death outlining numerous influential moments in his life which critics often speculated were present within his earlier work. Andrew Motion wrote "In a tremendously distinguished career, he has never written more movingly, or with a sharper eye".

McGahern's work has been very influential in Ireland and elsewhere. His work has been translated into many languages, in particular French.

Memoir (2005). Published in the United States in 2006 under the title All Will Be Well. Love of the World (2009) Collected non fiction and essays.

Amongst Women was filmed as a television mini series in 1998, directed by Tom Cairns, and starring Tony Doyle as Moran. One of McGahern's best known short stories, "Korea", was made into a feature film of the same name directed by Cathal Black and produced by Darryl Collins in 1995. In 1996, Korea won the Asta Nielsen Best Film Award at the Copenhagen Film Festival and was runner up for the Audience Prize at the Seattle Film Festival. A film adaptation of That They May Face the Rising Sun premiered in 2023, directed by Pat Collins.