Our Troubles|Anthony Canavan|Phaeton
Our Troubles by Anthony Canavan is a gem of a short story collection
by John Kirkaldy
Anthony Canavan’s Our Troubles is a gem. It consists of seventeen short stories that illustrate life for working-class Catholics in Northern Ireland during the Troubles. It is history, written from the heart, looking upwards from the doorways. It does not pretend to be an objective account; this is what it felt like on the streets.
Canavan reminds us that north Belfast accounted for one in six deaths during the Troubles:
‘I was personally affected by the loss of two uncles, murdered by Loyalists, and more indirectly when three of my aunts and their families were forced out of their homes in Annalee Street by a Loyalist mob while the British Army looked on. Also two of my cousins spent time in Long Kesh for their involvement with the IRA. In my wide circle, friends I had been to school with were killed in the Troubles or served time in prison. Some people just went away and were never heard of again.’
Canavan reminds us that north Belfast accounted for one in six deaths during the Troubles
The central character is Finn, who appears in most of the stories. Like Canavan, he is upwardly mobile, thanks to passing the 11+ exam, a grammar school education and a university degree. The stories cover a wide range of events, such as the ending of mixed streets, arbitrary arrest, being personally assaulted, stop and search, employment, holidays, attack by Loyalists gangs, and injuries and death from bombs. The reader follows Finn from childhood to the recent past.
Three things give the book the stamp of authenticity: vivid descriptions of places and events; compelling portraits of everyday characters; and an acute ear for speech and dialect.
The Troubles come alive on every page. Arrested with a group of suspects: ‘for most of the men, the greatest deprivation was a lack of cigarettes.’ A bomb-maker’s dilemma: ‘he did not want to see what his handiwork had achieved, or to hear from the TV that a comrade had been killed because a device he had put together had gone off prematurely.’ Walking in the street, there is a loud explosion from a nearby car; an informer has been killed. Pictures on the TV later show a hysterical elder daughter at the funeral, ‘who was crying like he had never seen anybody cry before.’
Three things give the book the stamp of authenticity: vivid descriptions of places and events; compelling portraits of everyday characters; and an acute ear for speech and dialect
It is also the smaller details that carry conviction. The sudden realisation in a sweet shop that a recognition of a school tie meant the end of any sort of friendship. A passionate affair between Catholic and Protestant is ended, when her Protestant brother and father find out. ‘Dad was angry but Henry said he would shoot you on sight.’
Lifelike characters abound in the pages as sensitively drawn portraits. A Protestant neighbour at the start of the Troubles putting up a Union Jack to prevent his house being attacked: ‘ach, you know how it is.’ Auntie Maggie, a frustrated stage performer: ‘she would arrive in the house generating noise, bluster and a cloud of perfume.’ In 1977, his Uncle Christy is gunned down in his sitting room. ‘I will never forget taking the phone call that night to say he was shot, nor seeing my mother collapse in shock when I told her.’
It is also the smaller details that carry conviction. The sudden realisation in a sweet shop that a recognition of a school tie meant the end of any sort of friendship
There is possibly no place on earth where accents are so varied in such a relatively small space than in Ireland. They are a barometer of identity, class, and place. Canavan has an acute ear and this adds to the authenticity of his writing as he captures the voices of the Belfast working class alongside English and Scottish soldiers.
There have been almost as many books about the Troubles as bullets fired but Canavan adds to our understanding by showing how Catholic views were formed and influenced (Finn meets no Protestants socially until university). Gunmen sit for two hours in the sitting room with Uncle Jimmy’s daughter, waiting for his return. They shoot him dead in front of the girl and try unsuccessfully to shoot her mother.
‘There is a hierarchy of victims in the Troubles’ Finn concludes, ‘and we, the Catholics are on the bottom rung.’
Our Troubles, by Anthony Canavan is launching at The Gutter Bookshop on 22 August at 18.30.
John Kirkaldy has a PhD in Irish History, worked for many years with the Open University and has been reviewing for Books Ireland since 1980. He has contributed to three Irish history anthologies, a school textbook, and has been involved in a number of Open University History documentary series. Aged 70, five years ago, he went round the world on a much delayed gap year described in his book, I’ve Got a Metal Knee: a 70-Year Old’s Gap Year.
