The Mookse and the Gripes discussion

A Ghost in the Throat by Doireann Ní Ghríofa (Tramp Press)

This is only other book I’ve heard of because it was discussed on Twitter. I think I’ll request this book.

Brilliant- last year a good handful of the books I read were about motherhood- this stood out from them all.

Have heard a lot of good things about this one on Twitter so I am looking forward to reading it.

I had heard great things from Robert

Oddly I think I am correct in saying that this book won a non-fiction prize?

Yes, which is why I was surprised to see it here.

And I kept reading about the poem it’s based on so I thought it was poetry. I guess this book has been a bit of a sleeper.

Gumble's Yard wrote: "I had heard great things from Robert

Oddly I think I am correct in saying that this book won a non-fiction prize?"

I heard about it through Rick O'Shea - generally when he exudes lavish praise on a book, I pay attention (I'm not too keen on his book club picks though) He chose Ghost as his fave non-fiction book of 2020.

I think it won the An Post Irish Novel Award.

I am about a third through it. I can’t see how it won a non-fiction prize.

I could not see at the time.

Out of stock through the publisher right now and not released in the U.S. until June, but I can get a UK paperback through Book Depository... (I'm sure those of you who keep up with various prizes encounter this sort of thing all the time, but I find it fascinating, since I'm usually so far behind release dates none of this ever impacts me.)

I just ordered it through Book Depository. Hopefully, it doesn't take too long to get to me.

An article by the author on the origin of the novel:

https://www.irishtimes.com/culture/bo...

Thanks for that, Paul.

I have just finished this. Very good although I found the second half lost a bit of impetus. You can tell it is written by a poet.

I'm going to have to go back and review the concept of rooms in the book - they get a lot of mentions. Or at least they do in my memory of the book.

Great reviews, Robert and Neil. Out of all of the longlisted books, I look forward to reading this one the most.

Impressed with this one.

And agreed with Neil's comments - this definitely ticks the 'gorgeous prose' box for the prize. And it does lose it's way a bit - though that only seemed a few chapters - went it gets into a more checking-parish-registers form of family tracing.

And rooms is definitely a linking device that she uses effectively.

And it seems a very worthy winner of the overall Irish Book of the Year Overall* and Novel Prize and yet also Foyles Non-Fiction Book of the Year. It rather neatly straddles the divide between essay, autofiction/autobiography and historical fiction.

* rather impressively Tramp Press have now won the overall Irish Book of the Year 3 times in 5 years - this, Solar Bones and Notes to Self: Essays

I started this book at the weekend, and blitzed a third of it in one sitting. That was Saturday. And now I can't seem to get back into it.

Did those who enjoyed it take it in in one big reading, or was it split over a few sessions?

Because five days on I barely remember a bit of what I read.

I read it over a few sessions but over a day or so (which is how I'd typically read a book).

I read it over 2 days. I had a sticky patch in the middle where I put it down a few times, but other than that, I think I just read and read until I got to the end (with a sleep somewhere in the mix).

I put mine down also but accidentally on my jam scone - so I was also left with a sticky patch in the middle.

Haha - I read it in two sittings but I haven’t forgotten it at all and this was back on November

I just finished this and enjoyed it. I don't know if any of you were familiar with the poem before, I wasn't, and am very glad to have discovered it, besides. A number of themes seem to run through this work, the two that stand out most to me right now are desire and disappearance. Though sometimes it did flag a bit, overall I liked how Ní Ghríofa built echoes between her life and Eibhlín's life on these themes.

Only 70 pages in but very impressed so far - I am loving the repeated imagery and ideas.

For interest this is the poem that she mentions in the text and which was part of her prize winning collection "Clasp" and is effectively a continuation of "“Caoineadh Airt Uí Laoghaire”

The Horse Under The Hearth

Quiet now, his stables. No clatter-hoof on the cobbles.
That morning: her saddle bloody, askew, and she
all stumble-legged, froth-flecked, nostril-blaze, trailing reins.
When her eyes found mine, I knew.

I took three leaps: the first over the threshold, the second
to the gate, the third to her back, then fast gallop
over boreen and trampled brambles to his spilled blood.

Everyone knows what happened then, I versed it strong
and spoke it often. But what of her?
Her neck, like mine, knew the rough stubble of his cheek.
I couldn’t leave her with them. I sent them out, his men.

And so, her head came back, in a wet sack that leaked in my lap
and reddened my skirts. I pulled the burlap back, looked
Into her eyes - sunken, unseeing –
Her ear torn, a delicate nostril crushed.

sighed when the hearthstone was pried away.
The fire and I watched as they dug. No one spoke.
I rolled her head into the hole, watched them
shelter her in dirt and stone.

Now, when I watch flames consume wood, I think of her
slow change from muscle and mane to bone and dirt.
When the house grows too quiet, I stand on that hearthstone
and dance. Each ankle tap, each heel rap brings me back

to those fast moments before
we found him, and again, it is only
us two, and we are galloping
and galloping and never reaching him.

Thanks Graham. That is powerful. I definitely want to read this one now.

I find it interesting that many of the reviews here pick up on different ideas and themes (eg Neil and rooms, Lee desire and disappearance ) - I think the book is resplendent in them

I really was struck by the drinking blood links from the narrator's life to the poem

https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

I'll just copy&paste my reply to Gumble's question about what I didn't like after I gave it one star...

What I liked was the impression at the beginning that it'd be some kind of poststructuralist écriture féminine (milk-ink, body-text), but the more I read the more I found it horrific in its depiction of cis-heteronormative femininity without any distance whatsoever. I had to drop it, that's how unbearable it became for me.

I can't see the rest of Men and Apparitions changing my mind, so this is my favourite book on the list - I didn't even get bored with the family history research parts, but having done a bit of that myself I may be a little biased towards that.

Very intrigued by this one... just had to order it!
Does anybody know how to pronounce the authors name?

The author herself in the car where the book was written - so you can hear her name, the poem and poets

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtCj2...

Gumble's Yard wrote: "I find it interesting that many of the reviews here pick up on different ideas and themes (eg Neil and rooms, Lee desire and disappearance ) - I think the book is resplendent in them

I really was..."

Drinking blood seems to be a minor "thing" in this year's longlisted books, as the narrator in Unknown Language drank a bit of the blood of her companion when she was cleansing the companion's wound. I've four books left and wondering if there will be more blood drinking.

Who hasn’t had the occasional cup of human blood...?

I just saw on Twitter that Doireann Ní Ghríofa’s sister, Éibhleann Ní Ghríofa died in January from cancer.

I loved this book. I felt it was more blood drenched than milk drenched though. Doireann Ní Ghríofa certainly liked nursing and babies.

What struck me was the juxtaposition of woman as creator of life and of great art with the erasure/invisibility of women. Ní Ghríofa revels in, wallows in, motherhood, her body literally creates several lives and sustains even more lives, she exhausts herself in daily, nightly, selfless acts while at the same time researching the life of Eibhlin Dubh Ní Chonaill, author of arguably Ireland’s greatest poem. Ní Ghríofa finds that Eibhlin is remembered for her one great poem, a keen for her murdered husband, but then only in relationship to the men in her life.

There was much about motherhood in this book, but I saw it as being more about how easily women’s contributions are forgotten or overlooked, then about motherhood. Why is there a poem, a grave, a marker for the murdered man, but nothing for the creator of that great poem?

This is my initial reaction to the book (before my busy weekend starts) another many layered book and I will be thinking about it for a long time.

I also loved hearing the Caoineadh Airt uí Laoghaire read on YouTube. It is very moving. It’s not Ní Ghríofa’s translation, but it was good to hear it spoken.

https://youtu.be/5Ih86JSmZWs

endrju wrote: "I'll just copy&paste my reply to Gumble's question about what I didn't like after I gave it one star...

What I liked was the impression at the beginning that it'd be some kind of poststructuralist..."

I think it was written the way it was because this is the author’s experience, she wrote about her life, without suggesting that her choices were the only legitimate choices. She is a cis female in a hetero relationship who clearly loves motherhood and all that goes with it. Not every woman chooses a life with a man, not every woman chooses motherhood, not every mother chooses to breastfeed that long, if at all, but the women that do make those choices don’t need to pretend that they are doing something wrong or horrific. It was simply her life. If she was non-binary, pansexual with no children she would have written a different book because her experience would be that.

WndyJW wrote: "endrju wrote: "I'll just copy&paste my reply to Gumble's question about what I didn't like after I gave it one star...

What I liked was the impression at the beginning that it'd be some kind of po..."

I agree, Wendy, and suspect that had the author written from any other POV (nonbinary, POC, etc) she would be castigated for cultural appropriation.

Right, there’s that risk.

Yet to read this thread but happy to note after the first hundred pages that this novel reminds me once again what prize lists do at their best: introduce great works of literature I could have otherwise missed. If it continues to be as good, it will likely to go somewhere in the top of my longlist and shortlist rankings.

So….I had a different response to this book. In the interests of full disclosure, I never wanted children and don’t have any which may account for my reaction. I loved the parts having to do with Eibhlín Dubh Ní Chonaill, and with the joys and perils of translation. I loved the style, the imagery, everything. I didn’t love the memoir of pregnancy and motherhood. It reminded me of my late 20s and 30s, as co-workers dragged them into work complaining about morning sickness, having been up all night with a vomiting child, the stress of packing lunches and getting children up and off to school, the constant laundry, running around, fatigue, lack of alone time, only to have them turn to me: “And, you, when are you going to start your family?” (I’d like to think I responded politely, but may have to take the 5th on that.) I found myself wanting to skim the motherhood sections to get back to Eibhlín . The novel would have been marvelous with much less memoir which for me got in the way of the research and the translation sections which shone.