The Sheila Variations

By the Lake (or: That They May Face the Rising Sun) - by John McGahern

John McGahern will probably be most remembered for Amongst Women, a novel that ranks up there with one of the best books I have ever read. He died last year (here's what I wrote about him then), and his last novel is called (at least in the States) By the Lake. The rhythm of it is slow, pre-modern almost. There's a mention of a television in one scene, and I felt a jolt - having forgotten about the existence of television for a bit while reading it. McGahern was always known as a rural writer. His landscape was rural Ireland, and the quiet lives lived there. Quiet, but intense. There is no real story in By the Lake, no plot, no big finishes, no climactic moments. It is the story of a group of people in a town in Ireland, who live around a lake. They are mostly in their 50s, 60s - approaching retirement. It's a rural community, many of the folks are still primarily farmers - but the modern world impinges. Some of them have freelance writing jobs, and have to fly to London for interviews. All of them have children who have moved on, who live in cities elsewhere. We meet them, we gossip with them, we watch the seasons change. It's a slow story (with sudden searing moments of realization), it's a slow stroll around the shores of the lake ... through summer, fall, winter, spring. Things happen. John Quinn gets married. His wife leaves him after one day. Brou-haha ensues. The Shah (a fascinating character - excerpt here) decides to finally sell his very successful business to his silent partner, Frank Dolan. A sign that perhaps mortality approaches. Everyone wonders how the Shah will feel - when he is not in charge?? Jimmy Joe McKiernan is the resident political in the town. He did time in Long Kesh, was on hunger strike. He passes out copies of An Phoblacht to townsfolk. He owns a bar, and 2 detectives sit outside it - all day, every day. Just in case. The violence of the North seems so far removed from the simple quiet life lived on these farms, and Ruttledge - who is probably the main character, if there has to be a main character - does not approve of violence, and does not approve of the aims of the IRA, the Provisionals or anyone else. In another book there would be perhaps a confrontation, a big one, between these two Irelands. The ones in the South who think, "Look, the North has to work out their own problems ... leave us out of it." And the ones in the South who think, "As long as our brethren up there are not free, then none of us are free." These are two very real currents in Irish life, and it's brushed upon in the book - but gently, easily ... as just another bit of the picture. It's not the main event. It's the main event to Jimmy Joe McKiernan, but not to Ruttledge. When the two men find themselves alone together near the end of the book - their conversation, as it is rendered by McGahern, is a masterpiece. I wish I could write that well.

Other things happen. Jamesie, the town gossip, and his wife Mary - worry about their aimless son Johnny - who has moved to London and appears to have become a bum. They get so nervous on his visits home that they barely enjoy seeing him. Patrick Ryan, the sleek almost malevolent handyman - travels around the country, job to job, leaving his farm at home to go to riot. He offers to help build a shed for Ruttledge, and it has stood half unfinished for a year now, maybe more. They keep saying they're going to get to it. And etc.

There is so much more - details, stories told, you get to know the rhythms of the auctions - how the cattle is sold, the competition between neighbors in regards to their livestock, how contemptuous the dealers are when they realize Jamesie's sheep have not just been raised for slaughter, but pampered and loved. It makes their job harder if the sheep have expectations of KINDNESS. "Fuckin' pets," growl the dealers.

I knew going into the book that it was plot-less. My dad had raved about it to me - he's a huge McGahern fan. McGahern spent most of his life, as a writer, very little known outside of his native Ireland- although he's a huge favorite there, and any book compiled by Irish newspapers surveying Irish people about their favorite authors - John McGahern always tops the list. Amongst Women was an international success (my God, what a book) - and By the Lake was as well. He began to be known on a wider scale just at the end of his life. Here's a post I wrote about him - with some good links, and good excerpts from other people about him.

Since I knew going in not to expect any big plot or story - I didn't spend the book waiting for something to happen. Just relax. Relax. Get into the time-span of these people. Leave your own. I love it that Jamesie and Mary's house are filled with clocks that all tell the wrong time, and are always bonging out the time at the incorrect hour. At the end of the book, after they have both suffered a grievous loss - they get the clocks fixed. There's a marvelous scene with a clockmaker - a guy in crutches, who sounds like he has cerebral palsy - who obviously takes great pride in his work, in a gentle specfic way - recognizes that the clocks they own are antiques, works of art ... and promises them he will get them all in sync. Jamesie, Mary, Ruttledge and Kate sit in the kitchen and listen, quietly, as all the clocks go off at the same time. Because of how McGahern has slowly set up this world, and has slowed US down - as audience members ... it is a truly profound moment.

By the Lake was originally published in Great Britain with the name That They May Face the Rising Sun, a superior title if you ask me. By the Lake could be anything although it also fits the book... The lake is another character in the novel, its moods, how it informs the characters, how they love it, feel trapped by it ... whatever. But That They May Face the Rising Sun is a goosebump worthy title. By the Lake is descriptive. That They May Face the Rising Sun is majestic, poetic, and speaks to a more universal truth. It cuts deeper into the heart of what McGahern was writing about, and it doesn't become clear until the last 30 pages why that is the title. So McGahern makes you wait, for clarity. He makes you wait to realize why the book is called that. And it comes out in one sentence. One sentence. Spoken over a freshly dug grave by Patrick Ryan. "That they may face the rising sun."

Magnificent.

I understand titles are often changed, for different audiences and sensibilities. It makes sense, I don't have an opinion about it one way or the other.

But in this particular case, I hope the American publishers will not mind if I join the readers across the pond, and call it That They May Face the Rising Sun. It elevates the book, transcends it ... after pages of farming and carpentry and glasses of whiskey after Mass and time passing and things happening or not happening ... life is passing, life is passing, that is all ... after all of that: Resurrection.

Because the rest of the book is so down to earth - (and isn't so much of our lives down to earth? We do laundry, we have drinks with friends, we shovel snow) - so prosaic and realistic ... such a sudden vision of transcendence slices right through you. Like the ending of Our Town when Emily realizes her life has passed ... and it is only now that it is over that she can really love it.

Wonderful book. I will miss reading it. My life has been intense this past month, with outside events and crises - I feel ragged, forgetful, am prone to crying jags, and have started oversleeping (a truly bizarre development, and can only be attributed to anxiety) ... With all of that going on, I have loved visiting That They May Face the Rising Sun every day, even in its saddest moments. I have loved slowing my steps down to match the pace of that world John McGahern so beautifully described.

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