There are some writers who, at the same time as delivering a great story, do it using language so evocative, pure and sometimes even lyrical, that they are a true delight to read. These are our literary chicks.
|
What makes Irish Chick Lit authors so successful? By the Irish Author Kate Thompson What makes us so popular? We’re noted for our charm, our wit, our generosity. We’re renowned for our culture, our music, our scenery, our joie de vivre and our devil-may-care attitude. I’m talking, of course, about the Irish. Once upon a time, it wasn’t trendy to be Irish. A generation ago, Ireland was seen as the war-torn arse-end of Europe, populated by poltroons and buffoons, priests and sad-eyed women. When I was a student in Dublin it was impossible to buy fabulous underwear, and the only shoe shop worth mentioning was Terry de Havilland. Designer clothes were housed in an annexe of Brown Thomas the size of a walk-in wardrobe, wine lists in affordable restaurants boasted a choice of red or white, condoms were available only from a family planning clinic, and Irish women’s commercial fiction simply didn’t exist. I was parched for reading material. Each time I got through my end-of-term exams I would dive into the new Jilly Cooper or Judith Krantz, and I was once so desperate for a fix of escapist literature that I helped myself to a stack of second-hand Barbara Cartland novels. I kept them hidden under my bed, terrified that my then boyfriend – a philosophy student whose bedtime books included Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus – would find them. Then something wonderful happened. A woman who had been writing a weekly column for The Irish Times – a column that was based upon the vagaries of human behaviour and featured random snippets of overheard conversation – published a novel called Light a Penny Candle. Her name was Maeve Binchy. Maeve was the first Irish writer to produce accessible, female-centric fiction, and suddenly Irish women – downtrodden and ignored for centuries – were in the limelight. There was a real sense of empowerment, of freeing ourselves from the shackles of male-oriented bureaucracy and priest-driven orthodoxy – and I know this is true, because I was there. Maeve was followed by Patricia Scanlon, and Patricia was followed by Cathy Kelly and Marian Keyes and Sheila O’Flanagan, and the overnight sensation that was Irish Chick Lit high-heeled its way proudly into the twenty-first century, elbowing the boys out of the way. Why is Irish women’s fiction so successful? When I was first asked this question, my automatic response was to cite the tradition of story-telling that has been nurtured in this country for centuries. Story-tellers – shanachie – would travel the length and breadth of Ireland, visiting homesteads and recounting fables by the fireside in return for a bowl of stew and a bed for the night. But the shanachie were invariably men. While British women had Jane Austen and the Brontes and George Eliot (Mary Anne Evans) to tell their stories, we had nobody. Irish women knew their place, which was in the kitchen, pregnant and barefoot (or in sensible shoes), not running across the moors with Heathcliff or reaching out for Mr Rochester’s hand or exchanging badinage with Mr Darcy and meaningful looks with Captain Wentworth. So when Maeve broke the silence, is it any wonder that a vociferous tsunami ensued? We had laid claim to a world where we had as much right to put pen to paper as our illustrious male antecedents, where we could broadcast our woes and celebrate our triumphs and laugh and cry with our sisters. That word – sisters – is the key, I think, to why Irish women writers have become so huge. There is amongst us a real sense of sorority, which I have been told is largely lacking in our UK counterparts. When I started writing, the Orange prize nominated author Deirdre Purcell was incredibly generous to me, and was effectively responsible for getting my first novel published. Today, if I were in need of advice, I would not hesitate to pick up the phone to Sheila O’Flanagan or Patricia Scanlon, and I count Cathy Kelly and Marian Keyes among my dearest friends. We routinely e-mail each other work-in-progress, critique each other, and bolster each other up. I have a friend who writes for the Irish soap opera Fair City, and every week we take a walk along the Pigeon House Pier, a mile out to sea, bouncing ideas for stories off each other. Sisterhood is an incredibly special thing, and that is essentially what women’s fiction is, because reading a good book is like spending quality time with a best friend. If the tone of this article is a little serious, that’s because women’s fiction is serious. It’s a multi-billion dollar industry and everyone in publishing is looking for that woman with the Midas touch who can make her readers care and laugh and cry and cheer, that woman who can make you think ‘That’s exactly how I feel!’ or ‘That’s exactly what I would say!’ or ‘Don’t let him talk to you like that!’ It’s not all about handbags and cocktails and Sex and the City frivolity. It’s about warmth and empathy and getting that fuzzy feeling and knowing that when you open the book you bought during your lunch break, it’s guaranteed to take you to a place you really want to be. I got my first fan mail recently, for my latest novel The Kinsella Sisters. It went like this: Hi, just a note to say that I've just finished reading The Kinsella Sisters and how much I really enjoyed it. It made me think of summer, nice places, family and friends - all nice thoughts! Thank you. Summer, nice places, family and friends: it’s the formula Maeve Binchy came up with twenty-five years ago, and it’s one that still works. Maeve, I salute you! Deirdre, Patricia, Sheila, Cathy and Marian, I salute you too! Now that our tongues have been loosened, may we go on sharing our stories with each other, our readers, our family and our friends for as long as they choose to listen. Your browser may not support display of this image.Kate Thompson is a professional actress and bestselling author whose latest book The Kinsella Sisters set on the West Coast of Ireland follows the lives and loves of two very different sisters. Rio and Dervla Kinsella are inseparable as children. Growing up with their alcoholic father and their desperate mother, in the picture perfect seaside village of Lissamore, they’re each other’s best friend. As adults they are complete strangers. Estate agent Dervla lives the highflying life of a successful business woman in her penthouse flat in Galway city; while bohemian Rio does odd jobs round the village of Lissamore in between swimming in the sea, gardening and bringing up her son Finn. When Finn leaves home to qualify as a dive master how will Rio cope without her only son and best friend? And when the credit crunch hits the west of Ireland how will Dervla keep her property empire afloat without any buyers? What both sisters need is a man in their life – someone to lean on but where will they find their leading man? Kate Thompson has been described as ‘Ireland’s Joanna Lumley’ and is the country’s most famous voice over artist. Kate has acted alongside the likes of Gabriel Byrne, Brendan Gleeson and Liam Neeson and spent nine years on the Irish Soap Glenroe before turning to writing. Her first book It Means Mischief was a bestseller while The Blue Hour was shortlisted for the Parker Romantic Novel of the Year. The Kinsella Sisters is her 12th novel. The Kinsella Sisters by Kate Thompson is published by Avon on the 16th of March 2009, at £6.99. You can find out more about kate here |
| Posted: 03/04/2009 11:24:53 Last Updated: 03/04/2009 11:28:14 |
Chick Lit > Literary Chicks :: Celtic Myth Makers