Edward Gibbon - "The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Vol. 5"

Agnes C. Laut - "Canada: the Empire of the North"

Victor Hugo - "Napoleon the Little"

Aristophanes - "The Frogs"

Annual Bibliography of Commonwealth Literature 2007
This paper argues that discourses of love in Ghanaian market literature for youth offer a view into complex negotiations of agency and empowerment. Drawing on Deborah Durham's notion of youth as "social `shifters'" and Francis Nyamnjoh's conception of the "interconnectedness" of agency, I take Ghanaian market literature as one specific case of how African literature for youth foregrounds questions of continuity and change as African societies enter into increasingly complex global relations. In this literature for youth, received notions of love, often constructed out of impressions from American pop and hip hop music, carry new notions of agency that compete with existing "domesticated" forms. Authors like Ike Tandoh and Evelyn Tay employ discourses of love to offer youth alternative avenues for empowerment in a context of socio-economic disenfranchizement. In a creative process of "straddling", this writing both reveals and reproduces the contradictions that obtain in youth configurations of agency.

The Foolish Lovers

S >> St. John G. Ervine >> The Foolish Lovers




"Your Uncle William's wanting a talk with you," she said. "Mr.
McGonigal's been here about the will!"

"I'll be down in a wee while," John replied as he climbed the stairs.
He wished to sit in some quiet place until he had composed his mind
which was still disturbed. He had hoped to have the railway compartment
to himself after Willie Logan had left it, but two drovers had
hurriedly entered it as the train was moving out of the station, and
their noisy half-drunken talk had prevented him from thinking with
composure. Willie Logan's loud laughter, accompanied by giggles and the
sound of scuffling, penetrated from the next compartment....

In the attic, there would be quietness.

He entered the room and stood among the disordered piles of books that
lay about the floor. A mania for rearrangement had seized hold of him
one day, but he had done no more than take the books from their shelves
and leave them in confused heaps. He had promised that he would make
the attic tidy again, when his mother complained of the room's
disarray. His mind would become quiet, perhaps, if he were to spend a
little time now in replacing the books on the shelves in the order in
which he wished them to be. He sat down on the floor and contemplated
them. Most of these volumes, new and old, were concerned with the love
of men for women. It seemed impossible to escape from the knowledge of
this passion in any book that one might read. Love made intrusions even
into the history books, and bloody wars had been fought and many men
had been slain because of a woman's beauty or to gratify her whim. Even
in the Bible!...

He remembered that Uncle Matthew had told him that the Song of Solomon
was a real love song or series of songs, and not, as the headlines to
the chapters insisted, an allegorical description of Christ's love for
the Church. There was a Bible lying near to his hand, and he picked it
up and turned the pages until he reached the Song of Songs which is
called Solomon's, and he hurriedly read through it as if he were
searching for sentences.

_I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine: he feedeth among the
lilies. Thou art beautiful, O my love, as Tirzah, comely as Jerusalem,
terrible as an army with banners!_

So the woman sang. Then the man, less abstract than the woman, sang in
his turn.

_How beautiful are thy feet with shoes, O Prince's daughter: the
joints of thy thighs are like jewels, the work of the hands of a
cunning workman. Thy navel is like a round goblet which wanted not
liquor: thy belly is like an heap of wheat set about with lilies. Thy
two breasts are like two young roes that are twins!..._

John glanced at the headline to this song. "It's a queer thing to call
that 'a further description of the church's graces'," he said to
himself, and then his eye searched through the verses of the song until
he reached the line,

_How fair and how pleasant art thou, O love, for delights!_...

"I daresay," he murmured to himself. "I daresay! But there's a terrible
lot of misery in it, too!"

He read the whole of the last song.

_Set me as a seal upon thine heart, as a seal upon thine arm: for
love is strong as death: jealousy is cruel as the grave: the coals
thereof are coals of fire, which hath a most vehement flame. Many
waters cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it_....

"That's true," he said. "That's very true! I love her just the same,
for all she's treated me so bad! _Many waters cannot quench love,
neither can the floods drown it._ Oh, I wish to my God I could
forget things as easy as Willie Logan forgets them!"

He closed the Bible and put it down on the floor beside him, and sat
with his hands clutching hold of his ankles. He would have to go away
from Ballyards. He would not be able to rest contentedly near Belfast
where Maggie lived ... with her peeler! He must go away from home, and
the further away he went, the better it would be. Then he might forget
about her. Perhaps, after all, it was not true that "_many waters
cannot quench love, neither can the floods drown it_." Poets had a
terrible habit of exaggerating things, and perhaps he would forget his
love for Maggie in some distant place!...

There was a copy of _Romeo and Juliet_ perched on top of a pile of
books. "That was the cause of all my trouble," he said, pushing it so
that it fell off the pile on to the floor at his feet. He picked it up
and opened it, and as he did so, his eyes rested on Mercutio's speech,
_If love be rough with you, be rough with love_.

Comfort instantly came into his mind.

"I will," he said, rising from the floor.



VI

His Uncle William was in the kitchen when he descended the stairs from
the attic.

"Mr. McGonigal was here this morning after you went up to Belfast," he
said, as John entered the kitchen. "Everything's settled up. Your Uncle
Matthew left you L180 and his books. It's more nor I imagined he had,
though I knew well he hardly spent a copper on himself, beyond the
books he bought. He was inclined to be an extravagant man like the rest
of us before that bother he got into in Belfast over the head of the
oul' Queen, but he changed greatly after. The money'll be useful to
you, boy, when you start off in life!"

"I'll come into the shop with you, Uncle William," John said, glancing
towards the scullery where his mother was. "I want to have a word or
two with you!"

"Very good," Uncle William replied, leading the way into the shop.

They sat down together in the little counting-house while John told his
Uncle of his desire to go away from home.

"And where in the earthly world do you want to go to?" Uncle William
demanded.

"Anywhere. London, mebbe! I'm near in the mind to go to America. Mebbe,
I'll just travel the world!"

"A hundred and eighty pounds'll not carry you far," Uncle William
exclaimed.

"It'll take me a good piece of the way, and if I can't earn enough to
take me the rest of it, sure, what good am I?"

Uncle William shrugged his shoulders. "You must do as you please, I
suppose, but I'll miss you sore when you do go. It'll be poor pleasure
for me to live on here, with you gone and your Uncle Matthew dead!"

"I'll come back every now and then to see you," John promised. "I'm not
going to cut myself off from you altogether. You know that rightly. I
just want to see a bit of the world. I ... I want to find out things!"

"What things, John?"

"Oh ... everything! Whatever there is to find out!"

"I sometimes think," said Uncle William, "you can find out all there is
to find out at home, if you have enough gumption in you to find out
anything at all. Have you told your ma yet?"

John shook his head.

"It'll want a bit of telling," Uncle William prophesied.

"I daresay, but she'll have plenty of time to get used to it. I'm not
going this minute. I'm going to try and do some writing at home first,
'til I get my hand in. Then when I think I know something about the
job, I'll go and see what I can make out of it."

Uncle William sat in silence for a few moments, tapping noiselessly on
the desk with his fingers.

"It's a pity you've no notion of the grocery," he said. "This shop'll
be yours one of these days!"

"I haven't any fancy for it," John replied.

"I know you haven't. It's a pity all the same. I suppose, when I'm
dead, you'll sell the shop!"

"You're in no notion of dying yet awhile, Uncle William. A hearty man
like you'll outlive us all!"

"Mebbe, but that's not the point, John. The MacDermotts have owned this
shop a powerful while, as your ma tells you many's a time. When I'm
dead, you'll be the last of us ... and you'll want to give up the shop.
That's what I think's a pity. I'm with your ma over that. I suppose,
though, the whole history of the world is just one record of change and
alteration, and it's no use complaining. The shop'll have to go, and
the MacDermotts, too!..." He did not speak for a few moments, and then,
in a brisker tone, he said, "Mebbe, one of the assistants'll buy it
from you. Henry Blackwood has money saved, I know, and by the time you
want to sell it, he'll mebbe have a good bit past him. I'll drop a wee
hint to him that you'll be wanting to sell, so's to prepare him!"

"Very well, Uncle!" John said.

"If you do sell the shop, make whoever buys it change the name over the
door. If the MacDermott family is not to be in control of it, then I'd
like well for the name to be painted out altogether and the new name
put in its place. I'd hate to think of anyone pretending the
MacDermotts was still here, carrying on their old trade, and them mebbe
not giving as good value as we gave. The MacDermotts have queer pride,
John!"

"I know they have, Uncle William. I have, too!"

"And they wouldn't lie content in their graves if they thought their
names was associated with bad value!"

"You're taking it for granted, Uncle, I'll want to sell the shop.
Mebbe, I won't. I'll mebbe not be good at anything else but the
grocery. I'm talking big now about writing books, but who knows whether
I'll ever write one!"

"Oh, you'll write one, John. You'll write plenty. You'll do it because
you want to do it. You've got your da's nature. When he wanted a thing,
he got it, no matter who had it!"

"There was one thing he wanted, Uncle William, and wanted bad, but
couldn't get!"

"What was that, son?" Uncle William demanded.

"He wanted to live, but he wasn't let," John answered.

Uncle William considered for a few moments. "Of course," he said,
"there's some things that even a MacDermott can't do!"



VII

John left his Uncle in the shop and went into the kitchen to tell his
mother of his decision. He felt certain that she would oppose him, and
he braced himself to resist her appeals that he should change his mind.

But she took his announcement very quietly.

"I've made up my mind to go to London, ma!" he said to her.

She did not look up immediately. Then she turned towards him, and said,
"Oh, yes, John!"

He paused, nonplussed by her manner, as if he were waiting for her to
proceed, but finding that she did not say any more, he continued. "I
daresay it'll upset you," he said.

"I'm used to being upset," she replied, "and I expected it. When will
you be going?"

"I don't know yet. In a wee while. I'll have to speak to Mr. Cairnduff
first about quitting the school, and then I'll stay at home for a bit,
writing 'til I'm the master of it. After that I'll go to London ... or
mebbe to America!"

She sat quite still in the armchair beneath the window that overlooked
the yard. He felt that he ought to say more to her, that she ought to
say more to him, but he could not think of anything to say to her,
because she had said so little to him.

"I hope you're not upset about it," he said.

"Upset!" she exclaimed, with a sound of bitterness in her tone.

"Yes. I know you never approved of the idea!"

"It doesn't make any difference whether I approve or not, does it?..."

"That's not a fair way to put it, ma!"

"But it amounts to that all the same," she retorted. "No, John, I'm
not upset. What would be the good? I had other hopes for you, but
they weren't your hopes, and I daresay you're right. I daresay you
are. After all, we ... we have to ... to do the best we can for
ourselves ... haven't we?"

"Yes, ma!"

"And if you think you can do better in London ... or America nor you
can in Ballyards ... well, you're right to ... to go, aren't you?"

"That's what I think, ma!" John answered.

She did not say any more, and he sat at the table, tapping on it with a
pencil. There was no sound in the kitchen but the ticking of the clock
and the noise of the water boiling in the kettle and the little tap,
tap ... tap, tap ... tap, tap, tap ... of his pencil on the table. Mrs.
MacDermott had been hemming a handkerchief when John entered the
kitchen, and as he glanced at her now, he saw that her head was bent
over it again. He looked at her for a long while, it seemed to him, but
she did not raise her head to return his look. If she would only rebuke
him for wishing to go ... but this awful silence!...

He looked about the kitchen, as if he were assuring himself that the
old, familiar things were still in their places. He would be glad, of
course, to go away from home, because he wished to adventure into
bigger things ... but he would be sorry to go, too. There was something
very dear and friendly about the house. He had experienced much love
and care in it, and had had much happiness here. Nevertheless, he would
be glad to go. He needed a change, he wished to have things happening
to him. He remembered very vividly something that his Uncle Matthew had
said to him in this very room. "Sure, what does it matter whether
you're happy and contented or not, so long as things are happening to
you!"

That was the right spirit. Uncle Matthew had known all the time what
was the right life for a man to lead, even although he had never gone
out into the world himself. What if Maggie Carmichael _had_
treated him badly? _If love be rough with you, be rough with
love!_ Who was Maggie Carmichael anyway? One woman in a world full
of women! She was only Maggie Carmichael ... or Maggie whatever the
policeman's name was! _If love be rough with you, be rough with
love!_ ... Oh, he would, he would! There were finer women in the
world than Maggie Carmichael, and what was to prevent him from getting
the finest woman amongst them if he wanted her. Had it not been said of
his father that he could have taken a queen from a king's bed, lifted
her clean out of a palace in face of the whole court and taken her to
his home, a happy and contented woman?... Well, then, what one
MacDermott could do, another MacDermott could do....

His mother got up from her chair and, putting down her hemmed
handkerchief, said, "It's time I wet the tea!"



VIII

He watched her as she went about the kitchen, making preparations for
the meal, and he wondered why it was that she did not look at him. Very
carefully she averted her eyes from him as she passed from the
fireplace to the scullery; and when she had to approach the place where
he was sitting, she did so with downcast gaze. Suddenly he knew why she
would not look at him. He knew that if she were to do so, she would
cry, and as the knowledge came to him, a great tenderness for her arose
in his heart, and he stood up and putting out his hands drew her to him
and kissed her. And then she cried. Her body shook with sobs as she
clung to him, her face thrust tightly against his breast. But she did
not speak. Uncle William, coming from the shop, looked into the kitchen
for a moment, but, observing his sister's grief, went hurriedly back to
the shop.

"Don't, ma!" John pleaded, holding her as if she were a distressed
child.

"I can't help it, John," she cried. "I'll be all right in a wee while,
but I can't help it yet!"

After a time, she gained control of herself, and gradually her sobs
subsided, and then they ceased.

"I didn't mean to cry," she said.

"No, ma!"

"But I couldn't control myself any longer. I'll not give way again,
John!"

She went to the scullery and returned with cups and saucers which she
put on the table.

"Would you like some soda-bread or wheaten farls?" she asked.

"I'll have them both," he answered. He paused for a moment, and then,
before she had time to go to the pantry, he went on. "You know, ma,
I ... I _have_ to go. I mean I ... I _have_ to go!"

"_Have_ to go, John?"

"Yes. I ... I _have_ to go. I was friends with a girl!..."

She came quickly to his side, and put her arms round his neck. The
misery had suddenly gone from her face, and there was a look of
anxiety, mingled with gratification, in her eyes.

"That's it, is it?" she said. "Oh, I thought you were tired of your
home. Poor son, poor son, did she not treat you well?"

"She was married this morning on a peeler, ma!"

"And you in love with her?" she exclaimed indignantly.

"Aye, ma!"

"The woman's a fool," said Mrs. MacDermott. "You're well rid of
her!..."

He saw now that there would be no further objection made by his mother
against his going from home. As clearly as if she had said so, he
understood that she now regarded his departure from home as a
pilgrimage from which in due time he would return, purged of his grief.
And she was content.

"A woman that would marry a peeler when she might marry a MacDermott,
is not fit to marry a MacDermott," she said, almost to herself.



IX

And so, when three months later, he decided to go to London, she did
not try to hold him back. He had worked hard on a bitter novel that
would, he imagined, fill men with amazement and women with shame, and
when he had completed it, he bound the long, loose sheets of foolscap
together and announced that he was now ready to go to London. Mr.
Cairnduff told him of lodgings in Brixton, where an old friend of his,
an Ulsterman and a journalist, was living, and Mr. McCaughan gave him a
very vivid account of the perils of London life. "Bad women!" he said,
ominously, "are a terrible temptation to a young fellow all by himself
in a big town!" and then, brightening a little, he remarked that he
need not tell so sensible a lad as John how to take care of himself.
John had only to remember that he was a MacDermott!...

But Mrs. MacDermott did not offer any advice to him. She packed his
trunk and his bag on the day he was to leave Ballyards, taking care to
put a Bible at the bottom of the trunk, and told him that they were
ready for him. He was to travel by the night boat from Belfast to
Liverpool, and it was not necessary for him to leave Ballyards until
the evening, nor did he wish to spend more time in Belfast than was
absolutely necessary. His Uncle and his mother were to accompany him to
the boat: Mr. McCaughan and Mr. Cairnduff would say good-bye to him at
Ballyards station. Willie Logan, now safely married to his Jennie and a
little dashed in consequence of the limitations imposed upon him by
marriage, had volunteered to come to the station "and see the last of"
him. There was to be a gathering of friends on the platform ... but he
wished in his heart they would allow him to go away in peace and
quietness.

It was strange, he thought, that his mother did not talk to him about
his journey to London. He had imagined that she would have a great deal
to say about it, but it was not until the day of his departure that she
spoke of it to him.

She came to him, after she had packed his trunk and bag, and said,
"Come into the return room a wee minute!" and, obediently, he followed
her.

"I want to show you something," she said in explanation. "Shut the door
behind you!"

"Is there anything wrong, ma?" he asked, puzzled by the mystery in her
manner.

"No," she answered, "only I don't want the whole world to see us!"

She went to the cupboard and took out a bottle of whiskey.

"Sit down," she said.

"Is that whiskey?" he asked as he seated himself.

She nodded her head and returned to the table.

"You're not thinking of giving me a drop, are you?" he exclaimed
laughingly.

There was a look in her eyes that checked laughter.

"If I had my way," she said with great bitterness, "I'd take the men
that make this stuff and I'd drown them in it. I'd pour it down their
throats 'til they choked!..." She poured a little of the whiskey into a
saucer. "Give me a light," she demanded.

He went to the mantel-shelf and brought the box of matches from it.

"Strike one," she said, and added when he had done so, "Set fire to the
whiskey!"

He succeeded in making the spirit burn, and for a little while she and
he stood by the table while the cold blue flames curled out of the
saucer, wavering and spurting, until the spirit was consumed and the
flame flickered and expired.

"That's what a drunkard's inside is like," said Mrs. MacDermott,
picking up the saucer and carrying it downstairs to the scullery to be
washed. He heard the water splashing in the sink, and when he had put
the bottle of whiskey back in the cupboard, he went downstairs and
waited until she had finished. She returned to the kitchen, carrying
the washed saucer, and when she had placed it on the dresser, she took
up a Bible and brought it to him.

"I want you to swear to me," she said, "that you'll never taste a drop
of drink as long as you live!"

"That's easy enough," he answered. "I don't like it!"

She looked up at him in alarm. "Have you tasted it already, then?" she
asked.

"Yes. How would I know I didn't like it if I hadn't tasted it? The
smell of it is enough to knock you down!"

She put the Bible back on the dresser. "It doesn't matter," she said
when he held out his hand for it. "Mebbe you have enough strength of
your own to resist it. I ... I don't always understand you, John, and
I'm fearful sometimes to see you so sure of yourself." She came to him
suddenly and swiftly, and clasped him close to her. "I love you with
the whole of my heart, son," she said, "and I'm desperate anxious about
you!"

"You needn't be anxious about me, ma!" he answered. "I'm all right!"



X

The minister said, "God bless you, boy!" and patted him on the
shoulder, and the schoolmaster wished him well and begged that now and
then John would write to him. Willie Logan, hot and in a hurry, entered
the station, eager to say good-bye to him, but the stern and
disapproving eye of the minister caused him to keep in the background
until John, understanding what was in his mind, went up to him.

"I'm sure I wish you all you can wish yourself," Willie said very
heartily. "I wish to my God I was going with you, but sure, I'm one of
the unlucky ones. Aggie sent her love to you, but I couldn't persuade
her to come and give it to you herself!"

"Thank you, Willie. You might tell her I'm obliged to her."

"You never had no notion of her, John?"

"I had not, Willie. How's Jennie keeping?"

"Och, she's well enough," he answered sulkily, "Look at the minister
there, glaring at me as I was dirt. Sure, didn't I marry the girl, and
got intil a hell of a row over it with the oul' fella! And what's he
got to glare at? There's no need to be giving _you_ good advice
about weemen, John, for you're well able to take care of yourself as
far as I can see, but all the same, mind what you're doing when you get
into their company or you'll mebbe get landed the same as me!..."

"Don't you like being married, then?"

"Ah, quit codding," said Willie.




* * * * *

THE SECOND BOOK OF THE FOOLISH LOVERS

Whoever loved that loved not at first sight.
MARLOWE.

"Love is a perfect fever of the mind. I question if any man has been
more tormented with it than myself."
JAMES BOSWELL, _in a letter to the Rev. W. J. Temple._




THE FIRST CHAPTER


I

Mr. Cairnduff's friend, George Hinde, met John at Euston Station. He
was a stoutly-built, red-haired man, with an Ulster accent that had not
been impaired in any degree by twenty years of association with
Cocknies. "How're you!" he said, going up to John and seizing hold of
his hand.

"Rightly, thank you! How did you know me?" John replied, laughing and
astonished.

"That's a question and a half to ask!" Hinde exclaimed. "Wouldn't an
Ulsterman know another Ulsterman the minute he clapped his eyes on him?
Boys O, but it's grand to listen to a Belfast voice again. Here you,"
he said, turning quickly to a porter, "come here, I want you. Get this
gentleman's luggage, and bring it to that hansom there. Do you hear
me?"

"Yessir," the porter replied.

"What have you got with you?" he went on, turning to John.

"A trunk and a bag," John answered. "They have my name on them. John
MacDermott!"

"Mac what, sir?" the porter asked.

"MacDermott. John MacDermott. Passenger from Ballyards to London, via
Belfast and Liverpool!"

"It's no good telling him about Ballyards," Hinde interrupted. "The
people of this place are ignorant: they've never heard of Ballyards. Go
on, now," he said to the porter, "and get the stuff and bring it here!"

The porter hurried off to the luggage-van. "Ill only just be able to
put you in the hansom," said Hinde to John, "and start you off home,
I've got to go north, tonight to write a special report of a
meeting!..."

"What sort of a meeting?" John enquired.

"Political. An address to Mugs by a Humbug. That's what it ought to be
called. I was looking forward to having a good crack with you the
night, but sure a newspaper man need never hope to have ten minutes to
himself. I've given Miss Squibb orders to have a good warm supper ready
for you. That's a thing the English people never think of having on a
Sunday night. They're afraid God 'ud send them to hell if they didn't
have cold beef for their Sunday supper. But there'll be a hot supper
for you, anyway. A man that's been travelling all night and all day
wants something better nor cold beef in his inside on a cold night!"

"It's very kind of you!..."

"Ah, what's kind about? Aren't you an Ulsterman? You've a great accent!
Man, dear, but you've a great accent! If ever you lose it I'll never
own you for a friend, and I'll get you the sack from any place you're
working in. I'll blacken your character!..."

Copyright (c) 2007. topboookz.com. All rights reserved.