Cassandra Voices

Tag: The Dead House

  • A Curious Irish Disregard for Historic Buildings

    Under normal circumstances tourists flock to Ireland for its rich cultural inheritance and traditions. Indeed we live atop generations of history. When the soil offers its secrets in the form of ruins and artefacts, we either attempt to preserve or reduce them to rubble. More often than not, we choose to tear down or bury the past. This often occurs without the general public being aware of what is happening.

    Perhaps our relationship with heritage is conditioned by a colonial past, with buildings  associated with the legacy of an occupation.

    Thus, in 1944 Minister for Lands, Sean Moylan, described the Big Houses of the Protestant ascendency as ‘tombstones of a departed aristocracy’ remarking ‘the sooner they go down the better. They are no use’. More recently, Nuala O’Faolain admitted: ‘We cannot, or at least I cannot, look at the Big House without some degree of rage.’

    Moore Hall, County Mayo, a Big House burnt down by the IRA in 1923, and subsequently abandoned.

    But this attitude towards our heritage seems to run deeper as the approach towards even pre-English history demonstrates.

    The Wood Quay Dublin Council webpage describes what is there as ‘a stretch of the original Hiberno Norse (Viking) City Wall dating from 1100AD.’ This, however, is a far cry from what previously lay there. The site of about four acres consisted of the remains of around one-hundred-and-eighty houses, thousands of artefacts, and a wealth of information.

    In 1978 the site was owned by Dublin Corporation. Despite the High Court declaring it National Monument, Dublin Corporation found a legal loophole to allow them to build new civic offices there. Despite this declaration and a ‘Save Wood Quay’ campaign involving over twenty thousand protesters, a petition, and Operation Sitric – a sit-in protest where people occupied it for three weeks – construction went ahead. It was a devastating loss for Irish heritage.

    Wood Quay, 1978, Dublin City Council Photographic Collection

    The O’Rahilly House

    A recent loss has been The O’Rahilly House on 40 Herbert Park. Michael Joseph O’Rahilly, who lived at the house with his wife and family, was the only leader of the 1916 Rising to be killed during the fighting itself. In the hours after the fatal exchange of gunfire on Sackville Lane (now O’Rahilly Parade off O’Connell Street) he wrote a letter to his wife who lived on 40 Herbert Park in Dublin 4.

    The house had been the site for many meetings of the signatories of the 1916 Proclamation. It is likely that three former Irish presidents, Eamon de Valera, Sean T. O’Ceallaigh, and Douglas Hyde, had all passed through its doors at one time or another.

    The house was demolished in September 2020 to make way for a twelve-storey hotel, and an apartment development, in the face of opposition from several residents associations, the Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, the 1916 Relatives Alliance and Relatives of the Signatories of the 1916 Proclamation, and Proinsias Ó Rathaille (The O’Rahilly’s grandson). Apart from the building’s historical significance, there were other problems identified with the project, including the disproportionate height of the proposed building.

    As of October 2020 an application for a judicial review of the planning forms for the site has been approved by the High Court. The Pembroke Road Association has been getting donations from all over the country on a daily basis towards the estimated €50,000 needed to bring the application. There was also talk about potentially rebuilding the house, or turning the site into a park for children, and to commemorate the 1916 Rising. Perhaps this site will fare better than Wood Quay, but since the building itself no longer exists, and Dublin City Council are involved, I am not holding out much hope.

    40 Herbert Park, before demolition.

    Literary Houses

    Hoey Court is where the satirical author of Gulliver’s Travels (1726) Jonathan Swift was born, in 1667. All that remains of it now is a plaque on a wall near Dublin Castle. This would surely have been a fantastic site for a museum dedicated to this world renowned writer.

    I hadn’t even been aware of its existence until I went on a tour on Dublin’s Dark side, led by John Caffrey. It’s a pity these aren’t the places we learn about in school.

    The House of ‘The Dead,’ James Joyce’s final story in Dubliners at 15 Usher’s Island is the latest of Dublin’s historical buildings to be refurbished. Joyce’s great-aunts rented the upper floors of the house in the 1890’s and ran a music school there. Joyce spent sufficient time there for it be used as the location for his famous short story.

    Since then it has gone from being a virtual tenement, to a refurbishment under Brendan Kilty’s ownership. But he went bankrupt in 2017. It was then ignored by Dublin City Council, before being purchased by private investors Fergus McCabe and Brian Stynes.

    Dublin City Council have granted planning permission to turn it into a hostel. This has brought complaints from some quarters about Dublin losing its character with the number of hotels being built and writers, artists and Dubliners being pushed out of the city due to exorbitant renting and housing prices.

    Indeed in November 2019 a slew of Irish and internationally-renowned writers signed an open letter calling on Josepha Madigan, then Minister for Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, and Owen Keegan, Dublin City Manager to intervene in the investors plans. The letter stated that: ‘In the decades since Joyce’s death, too many of the places that are rendered immortal in his writing have been lost to the city. Let us not repeat this mistake today.’ A compromise for both sides could be to keep the rooms as used by Joyce’s aunts for use for literary events and to proceed with the planned hostel rooms for the rest. That way the building isn’t falling into ruin and still preserves its history.

    The examples I have provided are among the many buildings that have been, or will be, lost and there are undoubtedly many more such notable buildings in Ireland that few know about. It is just a pity that we learn so little about this heritage in school.

    The National Monuments Act

    According to the 1930 National Monuments Act: ‘a ‘national monument’ means a monument or the remains of a monument the preservation of which is a matter of national importance by reason of the historical, architectural, traditional, artistic, or archaeological interest.’

    It also states that a building/site can only be tampered with in the interests of public health and safety or in the interests of preserving archaeology. The most recent addition to the National Monuments Act as of 2004 actually weakens the protection that National Monuments receive. This includes provisions for the partial or complete destruction of National Monuments by the Government of Ireland if such destruction is deemed to be in the public interest.

    According to section 14 the Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht can also choose to alter, remove, preserve or demolish a site for road works.

    Ruins of Carrickmines Castle. Dublin City Library and Archive

    The site of Carrickmines Castle fell victim to this provision. Previously classified as a National Monument it was the site of historical battles during the 1641 Rebellion and later the Irish Confederate Wars 1641-43. It seems that this particular amendment was brought in specifically for the M50 road to be built across the grounds. Yet the original plan was for the road to bypass the Castle grounds.

    Latest Developments

    A happy ending for one ancient history site is the incorporation of glass floors in new Lidl that opened on Aungier Street. The ruins consist of an eleventh century house, a stone-lined cistern and the eighteenth century Aungier Theatre staircase. It’s a way of keeping history alive and ads an unusual dimension to one’s weekly shop, in a time when we are crying out for positivity.

    Another excavation which will hopefully have a positive outcome is taking place on Ship Street near Dublin Castle. It began in March 2020 as part of an office block construction. The dig is near the remains of one of Dublin’s oldest churches, St Michael le Pole that was founded in the 6th century. There have been a few interesting discoveries already, such as the city’s oldest police cells, a punishment burial, and the skeleton of a ten- to twelve-year-old child. Other discoveries indicates that Dubh Linn (Black Pool), and in turn the Viking settlement, was larger than previously assumed.

    Heritage should be celebrated, not destroyed. One solution to address this problem would be to introduce a mandatory amount of time for an archaeological survey to occur, which would be factored into construction schedules regardless of whether any artefacts were found.

    As the Lidl on Aungier Street shows, it is possible to incorporate archaeology into the building in a way that preserves it, allowing the public to absorb the history of the site. Finally, where a change is suggested to the status of a building or site which is of significant historical interest and designated a national monument it should require a vote to be taken in Dáil Eireann.

    What is the point in having national monuments if they are going to be destroyed without public oversight? Successive governments have failed to preserve our heritage yet continue to sell this to tourists. If we continue on our present course precious few of our historical buildings will be left for future generations to consider the civilisations that have preceded us.

    Feature Image: Dublin City Library And Archive

  • Aye, Dead On

    It is easy when we are in prosperity to give advice to the afflicted.
    Aeschylus

    Protestations against James Joyce’s ‘The Dead’ House on Usher’s Island being ear-marked for a hostel are rooted in cultural-bias and emotional-led egocentrism, and exhibit blatant hypocrisy among the denouncers. Artsy sentimentality can be the lesser evil, but it is still based on emotional, and, cultural biases.

    The Aeschylus quote above may seem naïve with society unsettled by the Covid-19 pandemic – anxiety heightened and spurred on by the populist mediocrity – but the reality is, these past twenty years, we have never had it so good, especially with plenty of food at our disposal, alongside acres of indoor comfort available from pulsating warm radiators, hot water galore, and lest we forget our electronic devices yielding Netflix.

    A festive analogy may be relevant here, the geese have gotten fat and inactive. Selfishness abounds. Narcissism and the age of the red-carpeted self are traits which are promoted rather than rationalised.

    A thought-tormented age

    This was perhaps anticipated in James Joyce’s short story ‘The Dead’ from Dubliners (1914), when the character of Gabriel Conroy says:

    But we are living in a sceptical and, if I may use the phrase, a thought-tormented age: and sometimes I fear that this new generation, educated or hypereducated as it is, well lack those qualities of humanity, of hospitality of kindly humour which belong to an older day.

    Regularly trudging past ‘The Dead House’ on the banks of the Liffey I have noted its square, flat Georgian edifice. Its jet-black door. Joyce describes it as ‘the dark, gaunt house’.

    Over the past few years, it has come to light that this building on Usher’s Island is set to become a tourist hostel. This has led to cries of ‘cultural vandalism,’ but why were the same journalists and commentators silent when the building sat derelict for years? Unused. Unravelling and falling apart at the seams.

    For a year, I sat in on Readings of Joyce’s Ulysses in Sweny’s Pharmacy on Lincoln Place, and did not encounter a single Irish writer of any standing. At the end of each session a wooden bowl was passed around to the attendees, who would dispense a few coins to help pay the rent. No rich, successful Dublin-based writers were coughing up dough to keep this cultural institution afloat.

    The reality is that Dublin-based, and Dublin-enthralled, writers do not admit to themselves that Dublin has been swallowed up by the capitalist project. They are simply in denial.

    The cultural embargo comes out in plaintive cries of ‘How dare they wreck our heritage?’ from behind computer screen in comfortable homes. Keyboard heroes. One and all. It has to be said that some are indolent and sly, with one eye on anything Joyce-related to enhance their own reputations and further book sales.

    I do wonder – the Diogenesian cynic may ask –  whether many of them have actually deigned to read much of Joyce’s work bar a few short stories from Dubliners? They may want to be associated with his masterpiece Ulysses but are they possessed by it?

    Do they want to recreate the Cabman’s shelter under Butt Bridge or Bella Cohen’s bordello down on the now gone Tyrone street?

    In ‘The Dead’ itself, Gabriel’s face colours when asked about his writing for the Daily Express, a Unionist newspaper, and is even labelled as a ‘West Briton’ by Miss Ivors. In Dublin parlance a ‘West Brit,’ or ‘Castle Catholic,’ remains someone who would have no home-spun patriotic scruples in dealing with the mother colony for purposes of profit; the comprador elite of an ex-colony.

    How many Irish-based writers now have English agents, English publishers? How many have made their careers in London? More power to them, but the wedge of Anglo-Irish relations should narrow at least somewhat in the near-future. Here is hoping. Better to work together than at difference.

    ‘the dark mutinous Shannon’

    There is a great irony contained in Gabriel’s epiphany as he observes snow falling from outside of his hotel window in the closing monologue. He does not mention the Liffey, but instead dwells on ‘the dark mutinous Shannon waves.’

    In his biography of Joyce Richard Ellmann states:

    The fine description: “It was falling on every part of the dark central plain, on the treeless bills, falling softly upon the Bog of Allen and, farther westward, softly falling into the dark mutinous Shannon waves,” is probably borrowed by Joyce from a famous simile in the twelfth book of the Iliad, which Thoreau translates: “The snowflakes fall thick and fast on a winter’s day. The winds are lulled, and the snow falls incessant, covering the tops of the mountains, and the hills, and the plains where the lotus-tree grows, and the cultivated fields, and they are falling by the inlets and shores of the foaming sea, but are silently dissolved by the waves.” But Homer was simply describing the thickness of the arrows in the battle of the Greeks and Trojans; and while Joyce seems to copy his topographical details, he uses the image here chiefly for a similar sense of crowding and quiet pressure. Where Homer speaks of the waves silently dissolving the snow, Joyce adds the final detail of “the mutinous Shannon waves” which suggests the “Furey” quality of the west. The snow that falls upon Gabriel, Gretta, and Michael Furey, upon the Misses Morkan, upon the dead singers and the living, is mutuality, a sense of their connection with each other, a sense that none has his being alone. The partygoers prefer dead singers to living ones, the wife prefers a dead lover to a live lover.

    There are the true Joyceans who love Joyce for his unrivalled creative genius and dedication to his Art and more power to their elbows. Kudos my fair-weathered literary friends.

    A Hostel for Creatives

    What about it keeping it as ‘The Dead House’ by way of a Hostel? Let creative folk add their work inside: paintings. Musings. Writings. Musical nights. Don’t let it become a shell. A phantom dedicated to Joyce Ltd. The Irish Tourist mentality to wring money and promotion out from every Joycean occasion. He would really have detested that.

    Joyce’s attitude towards his ‘fatherland’ are perhaps best encapsulated in a memorable speech of Stephen Daedalus from Portrait of an Artist:

    I will tell you what I will do and what I will not do. I will not serve that in which I no longer believe, whether it calls itself my home, my fatherland, or my church: and I will try to express myself in some mode of life or art as freely as I can and as wholly as I can, using for my defense the only arms I allow myself to use — silence, exile, and cunning.

    There are plenty of Joyce tributes/buildings in the city, including, The James Joyce Centre, on North Great George’s Street, Davy Byrne’s on Duke Street, and Sweny’s Pharmacy, on Lincoln Place

    Dublin is a bustling city. A garrulous metropolis. Where many, many tourists flock. No doubt they will return. Let ‘The Dead House’ vibrate and echo some of that human activity; and wouldn’t it be great if funds were apportioned to update and renovate some of the sagging grey buildings of Usher’s Island on that stretch of the quays?

    As Mary Jane says in the story that the coffin, ‘is to remind them of their last end.’ An empty, dilapidated house is a soulless thing. A crypt, devoid of life.

    And as Gabriel says in his speech to the rapt attendees of the party on Usher’s Island, ‘Ladies and Gentlemen, it is not for the first time we have been gathered together under this hospitable roof, around this hospitable board.’

    And it wouldn’t be quite something to hand-over to the Land of the Living, salvaging something from the Land of The Dead?