Literature
When a book scandalised a village Lorna Hogg relates the events surrounding the publication of Valley of Squinting Windows
Delvin, Co Westmeath, birthplace of Brinsley MacNamara
‘They burned my book in the best medieval fashion..’ An intriguing comment by any author. Should we expect startling political revelations, perhaps, or a tale of Mafia style revenge? Neither of these. The Valley of the Squinting Windows’was set in the Ireland of 1918, possibly in Delvin, Co. Westmeath and any politics involved were mainly of the sexual variety. A century later, it is now connected with two stories. The print version tells a tale which may have been inspired by local events. The second one tells what happened when a community felt cruelly misrepresented in print – by one of their own. Westmeath born John Weldon (1890 – 1963) took the pen name of Brinsley MacNamara for his first book. He grew up near the small town of Delvin, where the family later moved, when his father John Weldon Snr. became a local school teacher. The young Weldon left Delvin after school, and went to Dublin, where he joined The Abbey Players, and he toured America with them in 1911. He also started to write, and it has been suggested that the inspiration for his first book, The Valley of the Squinting Windows was based on the real life story of a girl whose
reputation was deliberately ruined - on the advice of a solicitor. Her wealthy admirer took her for a ‘weekend’ in Dublin. She expected to return with a sparkling ring – encircling the correct finger, of course. In fact her lover dumped her on their return home. Everyone there knew of the trip – and she was then branded a prostitute. The incident tells us much about male/female relationships of the time. The girl, according to contemporary and local judgement, ‘fell’. She ‘gave in too soon.’ She ‘hadn’t made sure of him’. Women were objectivised in those times, physically and morally. One example is the fact that Brinsley MacNamara coined the phrase ‘beef to the heels like a Mullingar heifer, which admittedly, he used in an agricultural description. However, it entered popular country-speak – and was often disparagingly used in descriptions of women who lacked shapely legs. Women were judged harshly at that time, in terms of looks, weight, shape and breeding potential and also in their behaviour and attitudes. Men, on the other hand, were often too frightened to recognise or acknowledge their true feelings – or with Mother constantly in the picture, act on them. This provided the story’s background.
14 Senior Times l September - October 2021 l www.seniortimes.ie
