Respected Irish writer Julian Gough claims on his blog that while Ireland may no longer be at the mercy of the clergy, it has replaced their rule with a hermetically sealed cadre of novelists who aren’t open to change.
I hardly read Irish writers any more, I’ve been disappointed so often. I mean, what the FECK are writers in their 20s and 30s doing, copying the very great John McGahern, his style, his subject matter, in the 21st century? To revive a useful old Celtic literary-critical expression: I puke my ring. And the older, more sophisticated Irish writers that want to be Nabokov give me the yellow squirts and a scaldy hole. If there is a movement in Ireland, it is backwards. Novel after novel set in the nineteen seventies, sixties, fifties. Reading award-winning Irish literary  fiction, you wouldn’t know television had been invented. Indeed, they seem apologetic about acknowledging electricity (or “the new Mechanikal Galvinism” as they like to call it.)
I do read the odd new, young writer, and it’s usually intensely disappointing. Mostly it’s grittily realistic, slightly depressing descriptions of events that aren’t very interesting. Though, to be fair, sometimes it’s sub-Joycean, slightly depressing descriptions of events that aren’t very interesting. I don’t get the impression many Irish writers have played Grand Theft Auto, or bought an X-Box, or watched Youporn. (And if there is good stuff coming up, for God’s sake someone, contact me, pass it on.) Really, Irish literary writers have become a priestly caste, scribbling by candlelight, cut off from the electric current of the culture. We’ve abolished the Catholic clergy, and replaced them with novelists. They wear black, they preach, they are concerned for our souls. Feck off.
And Gough even claims he’s pulling his punches because he does in fact have great respect for some of those implicated in his rant. The Guardian picked it up and got commentary from other Irish novelists here.
New, young writers mostly produce “grittily realistic, slightly depressing descriptions of events that aren’t very interesting”, he wrote in what he described as an “intemperate rant”, posted on his website.
“Though, to be fair, sometimes it’s sub-Joycean, slightly depressing descriptions of events that aren’t very interesting,” he added. And it wasn’t only the new generation of Irish authors which came under attack from Gough. “The older, more sophisticated Irish writers that want to be Nabokov give me the yellow squirts and a scaldy hole,” he said. “If there is a movement in Ireland, it is backwards. Novel after novel set in the nineteen seventies, sixties, fifties. Reading award-winning Irish literary fiction, you wouldn’t know television had been invented. Indeed, they seem apologetic about acknowledging electricity … The only area where Irish writing is thriving in Ireland itself is on the internet, because it’s a direct connection, writer-to-reader. Blogs captured, and capture, Ireland in a way literature no longer does.”
Sebastian Barry, the Irish author who won the 2009 Costa book of the year award for his novel The Secret Scripture, said that Gough was both “completely right and completely wrong” about Irish writing – but added that he himself would have said the same thing “word for word” 30 years ago. “There is a feeling you want to clear out everything, and that’s what I’m getting from it,” he said of Gough’s opinion, describing the author as “a very wonderful writer”.
“The piece is more about his state of mind – he wants to start building afresh, which is what he’s doing,” said Barry. “If he’s in any way referring to me with his darker words, then so be it – next time I’m in Berlin, he and I will have to sit down and have an Irish whiskey and an arm wrestle.”
I can’t imagine why he paints with such a wide brush, other than the rage necessary to sustain this kind of rant, especially when I look at a guy like Roddy Doyle, who when he does write of the past does so with a distinctly contemporary eye. Don’t worry, Ireland. This happens in Canada about every other week. Tall poppies, and all. It’s good for clearing the artistic sinuses. And there’s definitely sometimes to learn from it, especially for the younger targets. But it will sure make parties awkward for the next few months.