Dave Gorman on Kilkenny
June 3rd, 2009, No Comments »
Dave Gorman is a writer and comedian whom I admire. His recent blog post about visiting Kilkenny, Ireland for a gig reminded me of the two years we lived in that country:
On that walk I passed three girls in tears with broken heels, three girls being helped out of the gutter by angry men, four men being helped out of the gutter by angry girls, one couple drunkenly helping each other out of the gutter, two people throwing up, two sets of lads squaring up like rutting stags preparing for a you-want-some scrap that probably never transpired and one fella clutching a blood stained hanky to his face because, I assume, he’d found someone who actually did want some.
That could be downtown Dublin on any given Saturday night. We actually spent a weekend in Kilkenny during the Kilkenny Arts Festival in August, had a lovely time and didn’t see any of what Gorman describes. We saw Michael Ondaatje read, and had a nice, brief little chat with him when he signed the unexpectedly Canadian edition of The Cinnamon Peeler. We also saw a bad Stephen Berkoff play, and wandered around the splendid Kilkenny Castle.
: Michael Ondaatje is the most elegant contemporary writer I know. With the exception of Anil’s Ghost, I’ve read all of his books (I took a class on him in university) and I’m a huge admirer of his craftsmanship. The Collected Work of Billy the Kid remains my favourite book of poetry (though I, admittedly, don’t read much poetry). The plot of Divisadero isn’t as compelling as, say, The English Patient, but reading Ondaatje is a bit like watching Gretzky. They’re a joy because they do so many things right.