Round Ireland with the Falange: County Wexford

That Keith Richards has really let himself go, hasn't he?

Quizmistress Anne Robinson: Which Mick is the lead singer of the Rolling Stones?

Idiot English Contestant: Is it Bono?

Those for whom Irish music is epitomized by the seisiún or the céilí, featuring a bodhrán player, a guitarist, a fiddler, a tin whistler and Shane MacGowan, will be surprised to know that most of the components of the traditional arrangements can locate their origins in the Iberian peninsula, with the exception of Shane MacGowan, who is as English as Pontefract Cakes and anal sex. You only have to look at his teeth for proof. The guitar, of course, everyone knows is Spanish; it was originally called the Spanish guitar, but this title eventually came to be regarded as a tautology because there was no other kind of guitar, the much-inferior banjo and ukulele being invented much later by slaves in America and Hawaii working in sweat shops making knock-offs. The fiddle is a cheaper version of the violin, usually associated with the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Northern Italy but so clearly related to the guitar in design that a good case can be made that they plagiarised it but never saw one being played and so improvised, using a modified horsewhip. The tin whistle or flageolet was invented by a Frenchman, Juvigny, in the late 16th century, of which nothing can be gainsaid except that although he lived in Paris he always wanted to live in Madrid, like all Parisians of his own and our age. The bodhrán, similarly, is a cheap imitation of the tamborine, this word being a corruption of the Spanish word Tambor, meaning drum. Here you can see the Tambores de Calanda, which are played non-stop for 24 hours a day during Holy Week, regardless of whether the drummers' hands bleed, get blisters and calluses on their palms, or get splinters from the drumsticks in their eyes, mouth and/or ears. They do this because to commemorate the fact that there were drummers following Jesus up to Calvary and because when they pushed away the stone from his tomb there was a massive drumroll from the skies. And then a cymbal. The only genuine and definite Irish musical instrument is the harp, which was invented by the blind Irish harpist O'Carolan (although he was not called this until after he invented the harp), and even then he didn't know what it was he was playing.

I was very keen to get to Wexford on my journey around Ireland because much of the archaeological and historical evidence indicates that it was here that Ireland's musical heritage began. It was here that Saint Iberius established his church, long before Saint Patrick ever arrived on the island (there is no record of Patrick bringing any musical instruments with him, although he may have driven the snakes out of Ireland with his awful tin whistle playing, the first snake uncharmer). Saint Iberius, who obviously came from Spain, lived on the island of Beggerin in Wexford harbour. He drew many disciples to his modest church, mainly wanting to learn to play the guitar or the organ. There wasn't much to do in Wexford in those days. We know from the story of another saint, Saint Veoc, that in those days it was a desolate, barren place, qualities that drew Veoc there from Armagh in the hope of a hermitic existence. Imagine his disappointment at finding the place full of spotty novices learning the first chords of "Smells Like Teen Spirit."

Sadly, Saint Iberius's home has now disappeared. I was advised by the lady in the Tourist Information Office with the square glasses and peppery hair that the island had become part of the Sloblands, which I assumed was simply a reference to the local council estate, but which turned out to be reclaimed polder land like they have in Holland, so that the island had been rejoined to the mainland. The lady in the Tourist Office also told me that I would need to get a licence from the council if I wanted to start digging there for the fossils of guitars or bodhráns, and she rather ignorantly opined that there were not likely to be any there after all these years. Which shows how little she knows about Creationism. In the same way that our Good Lord placed cenobites, Tyrannosauruses, saber-toothed tigers, and David Blaine in blocks of ice or inside coal mines to be discovered by humans as a test of faith, and also patience, so also he would preserve all the many important holy relics for worship by the faithful, rendering them incorrupted by the ages, the air, the bird poo, and science, like those dead nuns trapped in glass in the rue du Bac.

It so happened that this part of my tour coincided with a significant musical event in the history of Ireland, namely, the victory in the Eurovision Song Contest of the retarded Siamese twins Jedward, who you may have seen on the television being separated at birth by famous surgeons who also warned their parents that they would never be able to talk properly, let alone sing. Nonetheless, the Irish elected to be represented in the contest by Jedward as a way of sticking up a metaphorical two fingers, both identical, at the Europe that is demanding that they all work harder and also have no jobs. This is not the first time that Ireland has demonstrated such petulance, of course. Only the other year they sent Dustin from Turkey, who wasn't even Irish, and in previous years they have sent Mary Hopkirk, Johnny Rogaine, Dickie Rock, and Mary Peters and Lee. None of these did the Irish reputation for mellifluous Euterpian prowess any favours, and it was partly in response to watching these performances on European TV that the False Pope, Benedict, decided to ban rock and roll and support the call for the return to the Latin Mass, sung a cappella, with nary an amp in sight. This was a pope who booed at Bob Dillon when he plugged in his electric chair at Newport, Isle of Wight, in 1954 and began singing along to the godawful racket that came out. Then he turned it off and everyone realized the godawful racket had nothing to do with the electric.

Although from an Irish background, Dillon has never had the opportunity to represent Ireland at the Eurovision, and with him recently reaching the age of 70 and having been senile for the past 30 years, it doesn't look like he will ever have the chance to perform any of his classic tracks—"Wichita Grub Man," "The Times, They Are a Changeling," "I'm the Rolling Stones," and "Mister Tamberlaine Man" (he was also the inspiration for the well-known Beatles song "Hey Jew"—before an unappreciative audience of millions. It may come as some consolation to him to have been awarded only a year or two ago the Prince of Asturias Art Award (previous winners include Yo-Yo Ma, Elvis Presley, and Hitler), which recognizes rich celebrities who have done something vaguely artistic, such as commodifying protest songs, but I suspect he would much rather compete against Ukrainian Death Metal Yodellers, prancing puppets on strings like Jedward, and the German S Club 7. Any true artiste would want to show he could cut it with the best. I know that he was massively disappointed not to be invited to Princess Diana's funeral, where all the biggest names in the industry appeared on the largest stage of all—The Abbey—to show what they could do. Elton John sang his famous song hit "Candle with the Wind," which went straight to number one in the hit parade subsequently because the English people love funeral dirges and play them at all their parties. Then he followed up with "Rocket Man" and "Goodbye Yellow Brick Road." After that, blackface singer Tracy Chapman came on and sang "Fast Car," followed by the Animals, who sang "We Gotta Get Out of This Place." And finally Joe Dolce came on and closed with "Shaddap You Face" followed by a selection from his album Difficult Women. Dillon would have loved to have come on at that point and given a rousing rendition of "It's Alright Ma'am, I'm Only Bleeding," but apparently the Abbey was booked for a christening at six and the toilets needed hosing down.

I have not touched here, on my favourite Irish musician, who hails from a very different part of this pious land, but it would remiss of me not to mention a man who has contributed more to drawing the Irish people closer to the one true path through the medium of music than any fake messiah in sunglasses dodging taxes and swanning about with world leaders. This man, like Our Lord Jesus, knows what it is to be reviled, to be persecuted, to be mocked and laughed at and scorned for daring to speak the truth. He is thus a modern-day Cassandra, warning of catastrophe but never to be believed. And yet he persists. Indeed, only last year Jim Corr announced on the radio that he would, if necessary, stand for election for the European Union in order to save Ireland from the Freemasons. The government of Ireland, he warned, is riddled with secret societies, such as the Masons, the Rosicrucians, the Mormons, the Pretenders, the Persuaders, and the Champions, and that these societies are determined to sell Ireland's birthright to the highest bidder, probably Noel Eedmonds. He would not allow this, he said. He would do everything in his special super powers to stop it. He also made the very interesting and novel observation that the attacks of 9/11 in the United States were caused by rogue elephants in the Bush administration, a claim I had not heard made before.



Much as I admire the man, I believe his perspective on how the world works is nonetheless a little cock-eyed (an Irish expression which means he views the world through the eye of his cock, much like my randy brother Hornolo). It is not the Irish government that is the enemy, but the Illuminati in Europe, the bankers and cabals running the Masonic European state. Indeed, this is so obvious to any right-thinking Irish man that it makes me wonder whether or not Jim Corr is not in fact a false flag operation, a cleverly cultivated plant intended to discredit sensible fascist views with his bizarre rantings. His cloned sisters certainly suggest some kind of perverse scheme dreamt up by an insane Communist scientist in a Berlin atelier or Übungsräume. It is not beyond the realms of possibility.

Still, a partially accurate paranoid right-wing neo-fascist conspiracy theory is better than none. And in days like these, when you don't even hear the likes of aryan ubermenschen Jedward demanding that the elderly and disabled be euthanized, it's necessary to find solace where one can. Just don't listen to their music.

Famous people from Wexford include American "comedian" Des Bishop, monobrowed narcissist Chris de Burgh, founder of Irish music Saint Iberius (see above), and U.S. president Barack Obama. Although there is some dispute about this.

Lucky numbers: 0

Gemstone: Bakelite


Next week: County Waterford

Round Ireland with the Falange: County Carlow

Few people know that the Palace of Versailles is based on Bagenalstown railway station.

Carole-Anne Delaney must have extraordinary influence within the Irish media, or else the jungle drums of County Wicklow work remarkably fast. I was no more than ten minutes up the road, having escaped from her clutches, when I noticed people waving at me, pointing at me, or shouting in the distance and running after me. "Surely," I thought, she cannot already have written a book review mentioning me in passing and had it published in the Irish Times. Even if she phoned it in and it went straight into the online edition." But then I reminded myself that Wicklow is the natural home for the Irish literary intelligentsia/mafia, ever alert to developments at the leading edge of scriptorial erudition and technics, and they would inevitably have been following Miss Delaney on Twitter or Facebook. Thus it followed that those mobs in the distance vigorously shaking baseball bats, pikes, and golf clubs above their heads were well-wishers from the book-reading classes alerted to my endeavours and keen to offer some encouragement in whatever way they could, no matter how small and inconsequential. I waved back and offered them my most sincerest cheery smile.

I was half-way across the Wicklow Mountains National Park when I really started to feel the cold and thought it might be a good idea to put some clothes on. When it was first made, in 1954, the Dürkopp Diana was regarded as one of the most luxurious scooters on the market, but time has moved on, and heated handlebars, shatterproof windshields, and woolly gloves and boots come as standard on most scooters, I understand. I am reluctant to move with the times, but such an adherence to tradition has its downsides. Fortunately, the Diana does have sufficient room for a ruck sack or travel bag, a suitcase at a push, and I had had the foresight to bring with me an extra set of clothes should I lose my original and preferred travel outfit under such circumstances as had occurred at Miss Delaney's house. This change of clothes consisted in a pair of swimming trunks, 70-denier tights (jet black and therefore resembling leggings or, in my case, my legs), an Aran Isle sweater, a Real Madrid shirt (home), a deer-stalker hat, and a pair of expensive Italian shoes belonging to my dissolute and delinquent brother Hornolo. I had taken them from him without his permission but knowing that they are wasted on him. He has dozens more pairs besides.

A quick survey of the map upon exiting the park showed me that a small diversion of only several hours would take me to the Poulaphouca Reservoir, which I was determined to visit solely on account of its splendid name. Indeed, as I wended my way northwards along the R756 and R758, the wind smiled as it caught my words, unable as I was to avoid revelling in the name, reciting it endlessly to myself: "Reh-Serr-Voir. Reh-Serr-Voir. Reh-Serr-Voir." It has such a resonance, don't you think? For me it conjures up Celtic mists, hills of bracken, diseases long unknown to Western civilization but still kept alive in Irish hamlets cut off from the world for centuries.

Sadly, when I arrived, it turned out to be a lake. Nothing more. Two workman who saw my perplexity from across the road in their hut came over and were most helpful, explaining that "Poulaphouca" is an Irish word meaning "Pool of Water," "Phouca" or "Phucca," to give it its traditional pronunciation, being the old Irish word for water. I committed it to my memory on the off-chance that it might come in handy later during my journey should I be dehydrated, and counted my diversion as not entirely wasted. Interestingly enough, the workmen were at a loss to translate for me the word "Reservoir," that pungent and eloquent word so redolent of a lost Hibernia, and my Irish-Spanish dictionary was of no help. The nearest word I could find was "Rastafáraí."

I cut my losses. I wanted to get to Bagenalstown by nightfall, which meant a straight run southwards along the N81 towards Tullow before heading cross-country on some of the scenic backroads of County Carlow. The county's roads have long been known for their terrible state, the only rival to those of Cavan in Irish folklore for their potholes, crevasses, and sudden disappearances (to be replaced by paths of cowpat-friendly rubble). There is an Irish tribute band from Drogheda called the Ring o'Stars* who have a line in one of their songs about "10,000 holes in the R170122," which is a two-mile stretch of road just outside Borris. That said, the last two decades saw a remarkable turnaround in the maintenance and treatment of Carlow's roads, the intent being to attract tourists who would otherwise not feel inclined to visit the county, which has very little going for it other than its famed blandness. But with the brand new roads, the place had something else to offer. "Come to Carlow whether you have Haemorrhoids or Not!" was the Carlow County Tourist Board's slogan between 1998 and 2007. And people did indeed come. Tourism more than doubled during that period: up to as many as 831 people in 2003 alone.

The recession really bit in 2009, and last year's dreadful winter took even larger bites, mostly out of the concrete and Tarmacadam that had so mellifluously lulled visitors to sleep for many a trip. Consequently, Carlow's roads are as bad now as they ever were. Although it isn't just Carlow that's suffering. Winter was winter everywhere in Ireland. Saint Stephen's Green in Dublin's city centre now has chasms that stretch across several lanes, hardy weeds sprouting up from them due to a lack of upkeep, a decline in tourist traffic, and the price of petrol. Evolution seems to have bred a particularly hardy weed there, immune to fumes and with an impressive elasticity that allows the plant to spring back to full size after being run over by the 145 bus. Not that I believe in evolution. I use the term as shorthand for my deity, the way Richard Dawkins does.

In a futile effort to increase road use and thereby increase revenue through a tax on petrol use, the government recently widened the M1 motorway around Dublin airport, having been made aware of research showing that if you add more lanes to a road, they soon fill up with more traffic. This is an argument generally used against the adding of extra lanes and is premised on the existence of cheap fuel, but the government figured that if they make cuts to public transport at the same time, they could save money and force people onto the roads, thereby increasing state coffers. A brilliant move, if people have jobs to go to, although as it has transpired, the Port Tunnel, the largest construction project in the history of the state, transporting goods and tourists to and from the ferry port without creating congestion in the city centre, currently has a rate of use of one vehicle per hour. It is anticipated that, at such a rate, the project will have paid for itself around the time that our Sun goes nova.

With the population of Ireland back down to 3½ million and counting, it's difficult to know who the government thinks will be driving these cars. Children barely know their left from their right and don't have much pocket money left over for petrol once they've budgeted for essentials like red lemonade and condoms, and it may surprise this government to learn that the dead don't get out much. Zombies might be ubiquitous in the popular culture these days, but you never see them driving a car. It isn't possible without a functioning brain stem. Unless you count fans of Top Gear, that is, but they're already out on the road killing people. And in some cases, eating them. Perhaps the government is banking on the Death Coach picking up some of the slack.

But as we like to say in Spain, "He who shops with Catalans must take two wallets." Or, in other words, a hedged bet is better than a bet head. In Spain a few years ago, we had a very famous case of a disabled man in his motorized bed who was arrested for drunk-driving on the motorway on his way to visit the local bordello. José Antonio Navarro, who is 95% disabled, had got drunk and was intending to visit ‘Jade,’ a local whorehouse, but took a wrong turning off the roundabout. When he realized that he had taken the wrong turnoff, he decided to continue along the motorway in order not to put other drivers in danger. And fair play to him. This is the sort of inspiring attitude that the Irish government should be encouraging. I do not mean drunk-driving, of course, which even the Spanish only do at night-time, but if only the government was to open a few knocking-shops at the newly opened Apple services at strategic points along the motorways of this country (one just outside Galway would be particularly well-frequented), they could guarantee getting at least half of the Irish population out on the roads, whether they had cars or not. I have frequently seen Spanish men crawling on their hands and knees both to and from such bordellos.

I am not entirely sure how a bordello would go down in Bagenalstown, which strikes me as a very pious and devout place, even if at times ominous and filled with foreboding. My history book The Truth About Carlow!: Saints, Murderers, Sodomites, and Celebrities tells me that this was the place where Saint Laserian first considered establishing his church, before eventually building his cathedral in Old Leighlin. Apparently, he was deterred from building in Bagenalstown on Day One of construction because the first person he saw that morning was a red-haired woman, considered even back then to be a terrible sign. Consequently, he took the rest of the day off, like any sensible construction industry boss, but the next morning an angel came to him and told him to sit in the stone chair on the top of Ballycormac Hill and to build his church on the spot where the sun first shone. It turned out to be Old Leighlin. My history book says the stone chair was preserved over dozens of generations at Ballycormac until 30 years ago, near to a house now occupied by a Mr. Radwell. The father of the present Mr. Radwell broke up the chair, however, and used the stones in making a fence. His fate is not recorded, but I expect it was death.

Saint Laserian is recorded as having miraculously healed a boy who had been decapitated, but my book does not say if he, like Our Lady of Mount Carmel (see County Wicklow), used his laser vision (it was Saint Laserian who gave this particular holy power its name) in a kind of cauterizing/welding operation or if he just did it by praying. It does, however, explain why Saint Laserian is now the patron saint of shipbuilders, microprocessor manufacturers, and Bond villains. Even so, it was a holy power of no avail when Saint Laserian met his match, Saint Sillán of County Louth. While he did not have laser vision, Saint Sillán's eyebrow more than compensated for this lack. It was said that anyone who saw Sillán's eyebrow would die immediately. Laserian, being a plucky saint, tried to pluck it out. Unfortunately, he had to look to see what he was doing (my suspicion is that he pulled out hair from somewhere else on Sillán's body and upon looking at them doubted that they could be eyebrow hairs). One look at Sillán's eyebrow and it was curtains for Laserian. Black curtains.

This happened over 1,000 years ago, on April 18th. Which is his feast day.

There is a range of opinion as to where Laserian's remains can be found. Some say that he was buried under his church at Old Leighlin or under the high cross in Leighlin, whereas others say that looking at Sillán's eyebrow results in death by explosion and that Laserian has no remains other than those scattered around the fields of Leighlin and now well mulched into the earth that he once trod and ploughed with his laser vision. Still others wonder why Laserian didn't just use his laser vision on Saint Sillán and evaporate him instead of using his normal vision, but the rules of engagement for saints in combat against each other preclude offensive use of holy weapons. Sillán's eyebrow constitutes a defensive weapon, and anyway Laserian started it.

Famous people from this town include Beauchamp Bagenal, famous rake, drunkard, duellist, and former MP who fought his duels leaning against a tombstone; Swami Dennis D'arcy, the guru with a whip; and Barack Obama. Although there is some dispute about this.

Lucky numbers: 23, 12, 9, 1,034

Gemstone: Mud


Next week: County Wexford






The Ring o'Stars are less a tribute band than an Irish Oasis, updating and localizing the Beatles' lyrics rather than their music. Thus, they boast in their repertoire such classics as "Let It Beef," "Norbrinstown Wood," and "Lucy in the Spar with Dermot."

Round Ireland with the Falange: County Wicklow

"You're not from around these parts, are you, Señor?"

"On the run from the authorities and living in Cork."

"Died in the arms of a rent boy from a methamphetamine overdose."

"Lost his house in a poker game, went insane, now raising llamas in Monaghan for gladiatorial combat."

"Locked herself in a cellar in 2005 and refuses to come out."

"Jailed for treason."

"Fired for impersonating a gynaecologist."

"Caught cheating at Russian roulette. Told to leave the country within 24 hours. Training for the priesthood in Clare. Still impersonating a man."

A decade is a long time in journalism. It is nearly ten years. That is my joke about journalistic accuracy. And also it is difficult to drum up any sympathy for the plight of the average hack among the general public, who these days regard journalism as the first refuge of the scoundrel, a once-noble profession now reduced to regurgitating press releases, writing puff pieces for the local businesses who effectively pay their wages by deigning to advertise in their paper, or else rifling through the rubbish bins of minor Irish celebrities—all Irish celebrities are minor—in the hope of finding proof of sexual peccadilloes, infidelity, or drug abuse. They know precisely what to look for thanks to their own tawdry, sordid, sad, sorry lives.

I was hoping that at least one of my contacts would still be keeping it together after all this time, however. When I was working for Spanish intelligence in Ireland back in the 1980s and 1990s, I frequently had cause to liaise with members of the Irish press in order to help them put the requisite spin on stories about Spain, whether it was to suggest connections between the IRA, ETA and Colonel Gadhafi, cover up details of Spanish government involvement in helping Nazis on the run, or promoting Enrique Iglesias's latest single. Irish journalists were always very accommodating and co-operative, as you might imagine, in exchange for a box of Cohibas, a meal in the Four Seasons or Roly's Bistro, a massage and happy ending at Miss Whipcream's establishment in Dun Laoghaire, a day at the races with 500 punts to spend, or a weekend away at the Loughrea Hotel and Spa, all of which can now be won in competitions on TV3. Journalists once upon a time had a reputation for longevity, for the capacity to endure, to type out nine types of shit, 12 hours a day, on two bottles of Paddy and 40 Carrolls, and still make it out of Doheny & Nesbitt's before the wankers from Department of Finance came in after work. Unfortunately, the hard-bitten cynicism and contempt for authority once a pre-requisite of the self-respecting journalist has now been replaced by hard-bitten cynicism and contempt for oneself and the once-respected job of reporter, with the consequence that no-one can last in the job any longer than five years without becoming a parody of themselves, a mindless keyboard-banging monkey inebriated only to enable them to look in the mirror each morning without asking themselves how it came to pass that someone with a Master's from DCU and a 2.1 in English Literature could be pretending to have a shit in the bogs of Toner's just on the off-chance of overhearing a conversation between Eamonn Dunphy's daughter's nanny's brother and that bloke who does the cider adverts.

I had been hoping to drum up some publicity for my very important state-of-the-nation tour of Ireland by roping in some of my old friends and calling in a few favours, also known as blackmail. I am by no means a miserly man and can admit to a small fortune, on paper at least, if you count my retirement home, shares in Miss Whipcream and Jane Bondage's highly lucrative business, and the gold ingots that my neighbours the Mengeles back in the Canarias have stowed away for me, but paper money butters no parsnips, or as we Spanish say, "God will look after the blind driver. Those who can see must look after themselves." Therefore it was incumbent on me to try to find alternative sources of funding for my trip, and what better way, I thought, than to take advantage of the hospitality of the Irish, to exploit their reputation for welcoming strangers and milk the sow of human kindness, a kind of pig/person hybrid which came about through xenotransplantation rather than bestiality.

There being not one of my former journalistic contacts still capable of generating goodwill towards my endeavour—who, in any case, would trust a journalist these days?—I retreated to the nearest barbershop for my morning hot towel shave and a well-deserved haircut to reflect on my available options. I ought to point out here, perhaps, that this was no spontaneous, ad hoc decision. I am a particularly hirsute individual who requires a minimum of two shaves a day, sometimes three, and a haircut at least once a week, and experience has taught me that time spent on this unavoidable chore is the perfect opportunity for reflection and inspiration. In addition, barbers, at least in Spain, are the best source of underworld rumour, commonplace wisdom, arcane lore, and local gossip. Also they know 15 different ways to kill a man with a comb.

Gerry* the barber from Bray, for this is where I was on my tour so far by now, was a chunky balding middle-aged Londoner with sideburns who manipulated his blade and towel with a panache and bravado that would have put the great matador Enrique Ponce to shame. Barely was I in his chair and the razor disinfected than he had deduced my foreign origins and elicited from me the nature of my quest.

"We used to get journalists in here all the time," he told me, the flash of the morning sun sliding down the cutting edge of his blade as he scythed it through the air. "Once upon a time they took pride in their work, in their appearance, in their vocation." He paused to look me straight in the eye. Via the mirror.

"Not any more. Too ashamed to be recognized in public. These days they cower behind beards—even the women—and let their hair grow long and lank like . . . I don't know . . . greasers."

"What is greasers?" I asked, without dropping my gaze.

"You know. People from Greece. Moustaches, beards, lots of hair, unkempt appearance, smashing plates."

"Ah yes, I know this," I said. "Plates of meat: feet. They have smashing feet."

"No. Not rhyming slang. They smash plates. On the restaurant floor. When they dance."

This was a cultural stereotype that had passed me by, someone who generally prides himself on being able to compartmentalize and pass ready-made opinions of foreigners, but I took his word for it that this was something journalists do. I had often seen them standing on the bar of the Shelbourne Hotel urinating into one another's mouths, but smashing plates on the restaurant floor . . . why would anyone do that?

"I'll tell you what, though," he went on, "if you're stuck, you should try . . . wassername . . . the Delaney woman down near Greystones. She's always in the papers."

"She is who?"

"Delaney. You know. The writer woman."

I had no idea who he meant, having failed to stay au fait, au courant or au naturel with the world of literature, so it was with some embarrassment that I had to confess my ignorance of Ireland's most famous writer of chicken literature, Carol-Anne Delaney, author of the world-renowned "Irish Hearts" trilogy—Hearts and Carrickmines, Clonskeagh to My Heart, and Heart of Greystones—as well as countless other blockbusters that have remained on the New York Times Foreign paperback romantic fiction list for the better part of this century: Killiney and Tigers, A Celbridge Too Far, I Stepaside for No Man, and These Boots Were Made for Walkinstown.

"I can make a call for you, if you'd like," said Gerry. "I have a mate in the . . erm . . . legal profession who knows her well and owes me a favour. He can have a word and see if she'd be willing to meet you, mention you in one of her columns, book reviews, fashion pieces, interviews, that sort of thing."

"You could do that?" I said, turning my pristine, shiny face up in awe. Gerry just shrugged.

"Sure. I'm the barber."

And thus it was not two hours later that I found myself at the ivy-bordered front door of Rosacea Cottage, just outside the small village of Delgany, not a stone's throw from the Carmelite convent, where tradition has it that Our Lady of Mount Carmel appeared to the local children, who threw stones at her, and were consequently melted by her laser vision, whence the recipe for crème caramel. The door was opened by a purple-haired giant of a woman with a snub nose and what I assumed were shoulder pads, even though she was wearing a halter top. Her smile was a gleaming, brilliant, bluey white, the result, I later found, of chewing biros and Mint Imperials all day, habits that Miss—NOT Ms—Delaney had acquired early in her writing career.

"Much of the surrounding land is of no agricultural value," she informed me off-handedly as she guided me into the conservatory for afternoon tea. "I would rent it out to farmers, of course, even though they can be such cute hoors that most of my time would be spent keeping an eye on them, so instead I've had it all landscaped and called in one of the top Italian designers to give it that cultivated but louche look."

It reminded me that County Wicklow is known as the Garden of Ireland, an eminently suitable title, particularly given that it is indeed in Ireland. Calling it The Garden of Austria would be bound to cause confusion. Or worse, the Garden of Japan, since the Japanese Gardens are in Kildare, as everyone knows. But I was not prepared for the vast size of Miss Delaney's holdings. During the Celtic Tiger years, she explained to me, the Irish public couldn't get enough of chicken literature. They were flying off the shelves. Like chickens. At the height of the boom, she told me, there were 300,000 chicken literature books being published every week in Ireland, which meant that each individual member of the public had either read or written 16 novels. "And that's not including poetry," she said, "although there's no money in that. Only idiots write poetry."

After tea she gave me a quick tour of the public areas of Rosacea Cottage (she has an open day once a year during which she poses for photographs with her adoring fans, signs copies of her novels, accepts gifts and tithes, and gets through two packets of Solpadeine; she used to stockpile Kaolin and Morphine and let the ingredients separate, but Boots have stopped selling it). We then retired to her study/writing room to discuss business. I must confess that I had anticipated an airy, cheerful, well-lit room overlooking the extensive gardens, but Miss Delaney prefers to work ("and it is work, don't forget") in an underground bunker, lined with mahogany panelling and bookshelves, featuring not her works, as one might expect, but photographs, some of the author herself, but most of them of her inspirations: Mother Theresa, Dame Barbara Cartland, Margaret Thatcher, Mary Harney, Ayn Rand. "All strong, powerful women, Manuel, you will notice," she explained. "All of them knew what they wanted and pursued it single-mindedly, regardless of what anybody else thought of them." She caressed the frame of a picture of Mary Harney strangling a goose. "In women such qualities are invariably frowned upon, whereas in men they are considered honourable. Just think. Michael O'Leary, Jeffrey Archer, Michael McDowell, Gordon Ramsay. All of them admired, nay, worshiped and fawned over for their strength of character and determination. Women who exhibit those qualities, on the other hand . . . " Her voice trailed away and she shook her head dejectedly as she stroked Barbara Cartland's cheek. I felt it best not to express my personal feelings on the matter of the weaker sex and the emasculating nature of liberal society, bearing in mind that I had not yet been able to take advantage of her.

"It must nevertheless mean a life of loneliness," I ventured, a speculation that suggested empathy when in fact I felt that it served her right for taking away a man's job. But Miss Delaney had no time for mawkish self-pity. She quickly bucked up.

"Let's get some tea and biscuits and discuss your itinerary," she said.

Over the next 20 minutes or so I outlined my plans and offered suggestions for how Miss Delaney might help me: a direct donation into my account, going onto the airwaves and telling everyone to give me free food and accommodation, mentioning me in the opening lines of her next book review for the Irish Times ("The correspondence between Martin Heidegger and Hannah Arendt, skillfully edited and annotated in this volume by Martin Golightly, put me in mind of the fearless, handsome, and pious but humble Manuel Estímulo, currently making a tour of this benighted nation of ours . . . "). At most turns, she demurred, not contemptuously but firmly explaining the shortcomings in my proposals.

"You must understand, my dear Manuel," she said, "the emphasis in the phrase 'publishing industry' falls upon the second word. These days publishing is exclusively a business enterprise, and unless you are already a well-known public figure, publishing houses have no interest at all in attempting to sell your wares. The publishing world is a very conservative place–"

"–I am pleased to hear it."

"Good. But a consequence of this is that it is near impossible, especially in times like these, for outsiders to break in. Even those of us who are successful must write to a formula, giving our readers exactly what they want. I do not exaggerate. I can give you the precise breakdown of the plot, character, and storyline requirements for the novels of any of the top 50 novelists alive today. And that's before you begin to consider the tie-ins: film rights, product placement, toys, spin-offs, location cachet, newsworthiness. There's no point writing a book today about leukaemia or Alzheimer's. They've been done to death. Or autism. Or the Holocaust. You have to look at what's going to be in the news in 12 months' time. Who's likely to be dead by then? Is there a centenary coming up in 2014 that you can exploit? Or else make up a new illness. Growing old backwards, for instance. That's a good one. Or growing a new cock. How about that?"

I was crunching my Hobnobs with abandon by this point, making furious notes in the margins of the Daily Mail which I'd taken from the pile of newspapers Miss Delaney told me she was throwing out. But at the mention of the word "cock" I must confess that my knee jerked with surprise (and a brief experience of déjà vu as I recalled the first day in the showers at school). That jerk catapulted my tray of half-eaten Hobnobs to the floor, where the plate smashed and the biscuits crumbled. I looked up at her in horror. She rose from behind her desk.

"Not to worry, Manuel. I'll go get a brush from the scullery. I'm sure the maid will have something like that."

She crossed the study to the door but turned as she opened it.

"Of course, there is one other way of breaking into the business, you know, Manuel. You could have sex with someone already on the inside." She gave me what I thought must have been a meaningful look before disappearing up the stairs and into the daylight above.

Now, I am not fool enough to imagine myself to be a sophisticate, with all the worldly wiles of, say, an American. And Heaven knows that I have done my best to disdain and dismiss all material goods and pleasures as trivia, mere gew-gaws and trinkets of temptation by means of which Satan lures us into the maw of Hell. But even I have the presence of mind to be able to spot an opportunity for career advancement when it is presented to me on a plate, as it were, winking at me over its shoulder with its arse raised in the air. And therefore you will not be surprised when I tell you what I did next. As quickly as possible, I relieved myself of my clothings so that I would be ready and waiting for Miss Delaney when she returned to the room, having no doubt washed herself down there and put some lippy on (I splashed some gin from the drinks cabinet on my cheeks and gave my penis a quick spritz too just to take the daily stink off it). I then climbed up onto the Miss Delaney's desk, attempting to look magnificent, masculine, magisterial, and another word that begins with an m but I don't know what it is in English. And while I stood there waiting, I did some dynamic tension exercises I remembered from Charles Atlas that would make me looked pumped. Also I masturbated a little.

I was therefore a little disappointed when Miss Delaney returned not only still fully dressed and with no apparent lipstick on her mouth, but also wielding what I can only describe as the thickest, longest, knobbliest broomstick I think it has ever been my misfortune to lay my eyes on. "Unless I have seriously misread this situation and the next half an hour is not going to involve some rampant sex after all, I can't for the life of me imagine how she is going to incorporate a broomstick that size into proceedings," I thought to myself. However, and possibly fortunately, I had indeed misread the situation. Upon seeing my virile form standing erect upon her workstation, Miss Delaney at first screamed with terror, an emotion that soon took a backseat to violent, incandescent rage, which manifested itself in the way she charged at me waving the broomstick above her head.

"Aaaaaaarrrrrgggggghhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!" she yelled, channeling a million banshee howls, her huge shoulders now generating serious purchase through the broomhandle. I leapt from the table, the first swipe missing me by inches, and clambered onto the nearest bookshelf, hoping to scramble high enough to be out of her reach.

"Get down here, you vile man!" she screeched, swiping again at my behind, which hung down like a forbidden fruit as I clung to the rail protecting her first-edition Atlas Shrugged. I inched along as best I could, she still swiping with her broom, photos of Harney, Thatcher, Sarah Palin, crashing to the floor.

"Help me! Help me!" I implored, before realizing that there was nobody in earshot and that anyone who did happen upon us would simply imagine that we were re-enacting the final scene of the movie The Fly, my pink shaven head lending the scene a particular veracity. There was nothing for it but to jump and make a break for the door.

"There's been a big mistake," I said, trying to placate my assailant in order to improve my chances of escape.

"I'll say there has," she replied as I landed on the floor on all fours. "Get out of my house, you monster." She attempted to scuttle me off with a final swish, but I was already halfway up the stair before the broom's trajectory was complete, leaving my clothes behind, and I refused myself the luxury of looking back until I was at least a half-mile up the road. At least I'd had the foresight to leave the ignition key in my scooter.
















*All names have been changed to protect the guilty.