Reading under the influence: a literary guide to St. Patrick's Day

There’s nothing like reinforcing antiquated stereotypes to celebrate a nation’s culture. In the case of St. Patrick’s Day, everyone, including people who couldn’t find the little island on a map, finds an excuse to drink mass quantities of alcoholic beverages that have been dyed green. Authentic? Absolutely not. Fun? Definitely, at least until the guy next to you starts trying out his Irish brogue.

Being Irish, I harbor a deep and abiding love for St. Patrick’s Day that transcends the desire to drink Guinness, though I do. The alcohol is a small element of Irish culture, and if we can celebrate the country’s ability to produce ales and spirits, we can certainly take the time to pay homage to the country’s rich literary heritage. It is in this spirit that I offer a list of reading suggestions to make you feel proud if you are Irish, and feel jealous if you are not. For those of you who understand that whiskey and literature are not mutually exclusive, these five authors’ works are only enhanced when read with a drink in hand.

1. Oscar Wilde
Everyone loves Oscar Wilde. It’s hard not to adore a man who spews one-liners like, “Anyone who lives within their means suffers from a lack of imagination.” When it comes to Wilde, you have a few choices to make. If you’re in the mood for writing filled with witty observations of high society, go with one of his plays. My favorites are “The Importance of Being Earnest” and “An Ideal Husband,” both of which portray the misadventures of charming, amoral men navigating romantic relationships in London’s fashionable society. They’re good examples of the well-made play, and are easily read in an hour or two.

If you’re looking for something with a little more weight, The Picture of Dorian Gray carries a deeper message. Wilde’s only novel, Dorian Gray is the story of a beautiful young man afraid of growing old. He sells his soul to maintain his youthful appearance, which causes his sins and indiscretions to appear on a portrait of him rather than on his own person. It’s a classic, worth reading for the deeper themes of homosexuality and aesthetics.

2. William Butler Yeats
If March in Minnesota wasn’t so damn cold, I’d say read Yeats on a rainy day near a fireplace. However, as there is almost never rain in this snowiest month, you’ll have to make do with just the fireplace.

Choosing which of Yeats’ poetry to read is often difficult owing to the fact that he was among the most prolific poets of the 20th century. It’s probably easiest to choose based on the various phases Yeats went through as a writer. For example, his early work is often dreamy and detached, in the style of the Romantic poets but less accomplished. Then, as he moves into the 1890’s, he begins using Irish legends and folk stories as a means of centering his dreamy musings. The resulting poems are more lucid than his earlier work, and provide new perspective on classic Celtic contexts.

In the early 1900s, Yeats began to resemble the poet he would become. He moved beyond Celtic fables, and became a voice of Irish nationalism. During this time, he took part in founding the Irish National Theater, a move that would come to be classified as a turning point for the Irish Literary Revival. As far as I’m concerned, his best work comes during and after this period, when he had honed his craft and had a chance to mature as a poet.

I suggest poems like “Sailing to Byzantium” which, on a totally unrelated note, provided the title for the Coen brothers’ movie No Country for Old Men. Another of Yeats’ most famous poems is “Leda and the Swan.” For those of you who aren’t familiar with obscure Greek mythology, Zeus disguises himself as a swan so he can sleep with Leda without incurring the wrath of his wife, Hera. The tryst results in the birth of Helen, as in “the face that launched a thousand ships.” This one never ceases to leave me feeling a little puzzled. A swan? I just can’t figure out the logistics.

3. James Joyce
Ah James Joyce, the man who made my senior year of college a living hell. In a conversation about Irish authors, it’s inevitable that Joyce will enter into the discussion. Ulysses consistently tops the list of best novels of the 20th century, and for this reason it finds its way onto the personal reading lists of a lot of people. If you decide to go this route, keep in mind that you’re undertaking a challenge.

As one of the first modernist writers, Joyce’s work is often experimental. In Ulysses, he uses stream-of-consciousness and multiple narrators. He splits the novel into eighteen episodes, each with a distinct style of writing, in an attempt to loosely mirror the action of Homer’s Odyssey. It is at times boring, gross and disturbing, but if you can con yourself into looking at it as an impressive experiment with language instead of a traditional novel, it’s less frustrating.

Keep in mind that Ulysses is not a book you read in a day or two, it’s a real commitment. Don’t take my word for it, take Joyce’s. He used to lounge around wearing an eye patch telling reporters that his work was difficult enough “to keep the critics busy for 300 years.” Maybe he wasn’t lounging; it’s possible that my perception of him is slightly skewed by the grief he caused me. But his self-congratulatory praise makes it clear that he thought he was a pretty awesome writer.

If you do decide to read Joyce, I suggest starting with his short stories. If you absolutely must read one of the novels, go with Ulysses rather than Finnegan’s Wake unless you want to wind up rocking back and forth in a corner, curled in the fetal position. Also, you might need something a little stronger than Guinness if you’re dealing with Joyce, though anything helps. Try Jameson.

4. Samuel Beckett
A friend and student of Joyce, Samuel Beckett’s work falls somewhere between the end of modernism and the beginning of the postmodern movement. This means the rules have pretty much been chucked out the window. For example: One of Beckett’s most famous plays is “Endgame,” which tells the story of the last four people on earth. They live in a room with windows they can’t see out of. On is confined to a wheelchair and blind, one is his bitter servant, and two are the blind man’s armless, legless parents who live in neighboring trash cans. No one is capable of making decisions, and almost nothing happens. On the plus side, it’s actually pretty funny.

If this sounds a little too out there for you, try “Waiting for Godot,” Beckett’s most famous work. It’s about two men waiting for a third man named Godot. They aren’t sure they’re waiting in the right place, or even if they have the right day, which lends the play a sense of impending disappointment. It’s allegorical, so there are deeper meanings to search for, and this one, too, is actually quite funny. When you take these plots into account, it’s no mystery why Beckett was considered a major contributor to the dramatic movement called “Theater of the Absurd.”

5. Eavan Boland
She’s the only woman on the list, I know, but Eavan Boland is a representative of the rise of women’s Irish literature. For a long time, women writers were virtually ignored by the Irish literary set, but a flood of brilliant writing has swept the country in the last forty years or so. Boland is primarily a poet, but she also wrote Object Lessons: The Life of the Woman and the Poet in Our Time, a collection of prose writings about the history of the woman as poet, and women’s struggle to find a poetic voice. Her prose is fascinating, but it’s Boland’s poetry that makes her a notable figure.

I suggest starting with Against Love Poetry, a collection of poems published in 2001. There’s no master plan behind why this collection is the best place to start, but it’s where I started, and I fell in love with her writing. As in her other poetry, the poems in this book deal with issues of documenting an Irish history, understanding how that history has effected the landscape of Ireland, and combining the worlds of poet, woman, daughter and mother. Even men, who might shy away from something that comes off as overtly feminine, can appreciate the beauty of Boland’s language and the power of her symbolism. It’s interesting, too, to see the progression of Irish literature as it falls into the hands of a new generation struggling to bear the weight of past writers’ impact while shaping a new tradition. Try it, you won’t be sorry.

Those are my suggestions for injecting a dose of authenticity into your St. Patrick’s Day. Of course if you opt to stick with pub hopping on West 7th, I’ll understand; I’ll probably even see you there. But, as you slam your third Guinness at nine o’clock in the morning, at least offer a toast to the Irish luminaries who defined a continent.