39 pages • 1 hour read
Roddy DoyleA Star Called Henry
Fiction | Novel | Adult | Published in 1999A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
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Hierarchy and Servitude in Colonial and Post-Colonial Ireland
As a “result of hundreds of years of colonialism,” the Irish people treated their British colonizers with “fear and respect” (218). Meanwhile, the job of the revolution was to “convince” Irish citizens both “that they have no betters” and to take ownership of the land that was rightfully theirs (218). By the end of the novel, when Ireland is “free in some shape or form” (315), men such as Ivan who trained to be freedom fighters have muscled in and taken control of the land, in the exploitative style of the old British colonizers. Under these circumstances, the quest for Irish freedom has been futile; power is, once more, concentrated in the hands of the few.
Doyle shows how the consolidation of hierarchies has always relied upon the cult of an individual. Henry first notices this as a young boy, when he walks into a carriage-drawn parade of Edward VII, a “fat man” with a “mustache and beard that were better groomed than the horses” (52). Henry, who “didn’t know what a king was” (52), cannot understand what is special about this “fat foreigner.” It is only later that he learns how this foreign ruler and his descendants, with their old-fashioned paraphernalia of horse-drawn carriages, are delivering a mandate that affects the people of Ireland from afar.
In the aftermath of the Easter Rising, a different kind of hero begins to be celebrated: the martyr, like James Connolly, a brave warrior who lives and dies for the cause of a free Ireland. Annie predicts the popularity of this type of hero, telling Henry that “the country’ll be needing new heroes now that the English are after shooting all the old ones. They’ll need new men to shoot and love” (147). The novel positions both its invented hero, Henry, and real-life figure Michael Collins as candidates for the freedom-fighting type of heroism.
Michael Collins ascends to Parliament and becomes the stuff of legend, with the members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood at his command. Henry styles himself as a Captain and is sent all over the country instructing local boys in his particular brand of military tactics. Both men lose their positions: Collins to death, and Henry to being outmaneuvered by the power-hungry men he has trained. In showing the ephemeral nature of Ireland’s nationalist martyr worship, Doyle both reflects on the events of history and shows how personal ambition inevitably follows the overthrow of the old order. By 1922, the people in charge of Ireland act in much the same way as the British. When Henry encounters Ivan in his new role, as despot of the land around the old Fitzgalway estate, he says, “How come the baddies are always fat?” (313)—a reference to Edward VII and an obvious point about them taking up more than their fair share.
In giving father and son parallel fates, Doyle shows that the life of a working-class male remains much the same under Republican rule. Those like Alfie Gandon maintain their hold on power throughout the transition from British colonial state to Free Irish Republic. Henry notes that both he and his father have been hitmen in the service of the same man; Henry’s father was paid, whereas Henry, who served the glorified idea of freeing Ireland, was not. At the end of the novel, when Henry is on the run, he realizes that the only viable end to his struggles is to leave his beloved country, along with the stale, mocking atmosphere and the new hierarchy that has set the same traps that his father endured.
Changing Times, Changing Women
Although Doyle’s novel is a male coming-of-age story and features the traditionally masculine worlds of politics and warfare, women play an instrumental role in Henry’s character development. Moreover, the status of women is an important barometer of freedom in both colonial and revolutionary Ireland.
The women in turn-of-the-century colonial Dublin exercise their power within the bounds that patriarchal society allows. Henry’s young working-class mother, Melody, has the least amount of power. Having given up her work at Mitchell’s rosary bead factory to marry Henry Smart and start a family, Melody depends on her husband’s erratic earnings and finds herself repeatedly evicted, forced to dwell in ever danker surroundings, and unable to care for her demanding children, half of whom die in infancy.
Melody’s wretched inability to control her life is echoed in the fates of other women in the neighborhood, who endure such indignities as the syphilis their husbands bring home after a night with prostitutes. Although Melody “lived bang in the middle of a place that survived on the buying and selling of sex” and her husband is employed as a bouncer in a brothel, “she’d never noticed” (10). Instead, Melody lives in her own idyll, cherishing her “blue statue of Mary” and looking up to the stars for reminders of her dead children (12). Unwilling to rely on Henry or herself, Melody surrenders to an invisible higher power, an example of how religion takes hold and dominates when the poor masses feel that they have no control over their lives.
Whereas Melody retreats into a world of her own making, other women quickly master the ways of the world they inhabit and gain a measure of control over it. Although Dolly, the mistress of a brothel, was raped by Gandon when she was only 13, she soon gains charge of her establishment, the biggest in an area that offers plenty of sex for hire. By keeping tabs on such worldly events as races and incoming ships, Dolly predicts the days when business will boom. Additionally, in homogenizing her girls by calling all of them Maria and insisting that they do not go out in the sun, she gives her brothel the distinct identity it needs to thrive in a world of many like establishments.
Like Dolly, Granny Nash, Henry’s unaffectionate grandmother, gains standing in the world through her eccentricity and assertiveness. “A leathery old witch” in Henry’s eyes (1), who, “wrapped in her sweating black shawl […] could have crept out of any century” (2), observes the time she lives in whilst evading its worst afflictions. Always accompanied by a classic text by the likes of Tolstoy or Shakespeare, and having acquired Dublin’s largest library of texts written by women, Granny Nash demonstrates a literacy atypical of a working-class woman. Although the revolutionary years do little to change her personal circumstances, she lends her books to Henry, ensuring that he continues his literary education whilst on the road.
The upheaval around the Easter Rising and World War I brings greater change to a younger generation of women who play a more visible role. Miss O’Shea, a former teacher, becomes a member of Cumman na mBan, which translates from the Irish as “League of Women.” She assists the male Irish Volunteers in their endeavors for independence; however, despite donning a uniform with “the badge on her breast, the rifle held by the slender curling letters. C na mB” (108), the men in the movement believe that she should have little to do with rifles and more to do with mending their haversacks and cooking them stew. Not content to merely help the boys, Miss O’Shea seizes her “freedom […] to do whatever I want” and goes about the countryside as a gunwoman (122), shooting anyone who interferes with her idea of a republic.
While Henry, who becomes her husband, supports his wife’s activities, her cousin Ivan is intimidated by her threat to his power. He accuses her of “queering” the power situation in the local area by subverting traditional hierarchies that give men power over women and landowners power over tenants. Ivan punishes Miss O’Shea by shearing off her hair, stripping her of her most feminine attribute and her pride. Although Ivan intends to force Miss O’Shea to retreat into the home, she continues to fight until the new Republican authorities throw her in jail.
Through the example of Miss O’Shea, Doyle shows the potential for a radical restructuring of traditional gender hierarchy, which existed in the wake of the Easter Rising. Ivan’s attempts to squelch Miss O’Shea’s power, however, reflect what actually happened: The new Republicans acted to ensure that women stayed in the home and were not visible in public life. While this led to whole new generations of Melodys, victimized by their circumstances and in thrall to the Catholic religion, the women who continued to keep a hold on power were more like Granny Nash, who acted in her own interest, autonomously and invisibly.
Surviving vs. Thriving
According to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, survival is the primary aim of life; only when the objectives of being fed, safe, and sheltered have been met can a person begin to think about self-actualization. Doyle’s coming-of-age narrative continually navigates the tension between the need to survive and the desire to thrive.
For Henry, born in the Dublin slums, surviving and thriving go hand in hand. Realizing that his parents will not call him by his given name—“they picked me up, patted me, smacked my arse, fed me, loved me, cleaned me—but they never called me Henry” (33-34)—Henry refuses to be satisfied with all their practical favors and “screamed my right to be named” (34). Henry’s preoccupation with naming speaks to his anxiety that he doesn’t belong and isn’t legitimate. When his mother points out that her original little Henry is in the stars, surviving Henry seeks to become a star in the world he lives in, regardless of circumstances which sometimes leave him hungry and unsafe.
When Henry and his brother Victor are homeless and struggling to survive on the streets, they insist on the need to “to better ourselves” and go to the national school (70). Henry absorbs all he can from the classroom before the nuns take it away from him; his next lesson in reading comes from none other than the Easter Rising martyr, James Connolly, who helps him comprehend the Proclamation of Independence. Henry’s voracious pursuit of education continues even when he is on the run from the British. It also shows later when he returns to Granny Nash’s house to borrow books and continually refers to a manual of military tactics called Small Wars: Their Principles and Practice. For Henry, the world of letters opens up possibilities beyond the here and now, whether new strategies for winning a war or an addendum to the Proclamation of Independence on the rights of children. Through his private reading, Henry thrives separate from his life in the IRA, where he is expected to unquestioningly follow orders.
Henry’s sexual encounters with Miss O’Shea, Annie, and numerous women who throw themselves at him initially seem like a symptom of thriving. The women he beds, however, in addition to being charmed by his good looks, provide him with shelter and food, thus enhancing his ability to survive. When Miss O’Shea becomes his wife, and they both get in trouble with the authorities, Henry finds that both of their lives have become a matter of survival. Although he does not have a plan, Henry’s desire to thrive is such that he feels that he has no choice: He leaves a country that would keep him forever subservient and struggling to meet his most basic, animal needs.
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By Roddy Doyle
