Essay on "Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry"

Question: Consider William Carleton's Introduction to Traits and Stories as an essay that combines autobiography, social criticism and cultural idealism.

Without doubt, the Introduction to Traits and Stories is an interesting study in the complexity of Anglo/Irish relations during the 19th century. Its author, William Carleton was the son of a tenant farmer in Prillisk, Co. Tyrone, and one of 14 children. However, although Carleton had a peasant upbringing and only received a basic education, his ambition to become more than "a mere tiller of the earth"¹ and his natural love of reading gave him the strength to endure several tortuous stints at hedge school. Through a combination of what passed for formal education for poor Catholics in Ireland, and self-taught learning, Carlton succeeded in becoming a very erudite and well-read man. At the time, England was viewed by many in Ireland as being a centre of influence and learning.
As a consequence, poor, uneducated, rural Ireland was seen as something of a backwater. The modern world was emerging from the smoke of the great industrial British cities and English was its language. In contrast, Ireland and the Irish language seemed to hearken back to a previous era. It is interesting to note that in Irish, "ag dul siar" means "to go backward", or "to go West". The West of Ireland has historically been the most Gaelic part of the country, and although it may be a coincidence, the association between Irishness and backwardness seems to be enshrined in the very language.
Carleton's level of education and refinement automatically set him apart from many of his compatriots. This meant that in a way, Carleton was forced out of a peasant identity into what was viewed as an English identity. Therefore, when he writes about the peasant Irish, he always writes at a remove. He tells his stories from a journalistic perspective, largely for the consumption of an English audience. He is the messenger, the go between, and often literally, the translator. He often refers to the Irish peasants as "the people", a choice of words which serves to distance him from them. However, it seems that Carleton is not comfortable occupying this ambiguous position between Irishness and Englishness. Reading the Introduction, one gets the sense that being Irish is an intrinsic part of Carleton's identity. For instance, he tells us that he:
"...mingled in the sports and pastimes of the people, until indulgence in them became the predominant passion of my youth. Throwing the stone, wrestling, leaping, foot-ball, and every other description of athletic exercise filled up the measure of my early happiness. I attended every wake, dance, fair, and merry- making in the neighbourhood, and became so celebrated for dancing hornpipes, jigs and reels, that I was soon without a rival in the parish, "¹


What's more, all the people Carleton ever knew and loved would have been almost exclusively Irish. His national pride is unmistakeable in lines such as:
"there is no man so exquisitely affectionate and humanized as the Irish....to be a stranger and friendless, or suffering hunger and thirst, is at any time a sufficient passport to his heart and purse...here it is where the Irishman immeasurably outstrips all competitors"¹
For that reason, one could say that Carleton has a personal stake in trying to create an Irish literature. As he puts it: "Ireland was not then what she is now fast becoming, a reading and consequently a thinking country"¹. For Carleton, a thriving national literature and discourse would allow one to be educated without diminishing one's Irishness. Thus, both sides of his personality could be reconciled.
Centuries of English rule, and unflattering caricatures in popular English literature of the blundering stage "Paddy" meant that at the time, there was a strong stigma attached to being Irish. Also beginning to emerge from the 1840s on, was a more brutal image, found in political cartoons which depicted the Irish race as being simian-like. "...I am haunted by the human chimpanzees I saw along that hundred miles of horrible country..." (Lyons, Culture 12/E.Hirsch) Carleton states that one of the aims of Traits and Stories was to counteract these anti-Irish stereotypes and explain how they might have come about.
He tells the reader that the reason why the Irish are so often depicted as foolish and blundering on the English stage is due to the linguistic misunderstandings which arise when the Irish converse with the English. This, he tells us, is simply due to the fact that many of the Irish are not as comfortable with the English language as in their native Irish tongue, but where English is the vernacular - "..it is spoken with far more purity and grammatical precision than is to be heard beyond the Channel."¹
As for the stereotype that portrays the Irish as being violent and brutish, he says that:
"[the Irish are] in general a peaceful and enduring people ; and it was only when some act of unjustifiable severity, or oppression in the person of a middleman, agent, or hard-hearted landlord, drove them houseless upon the world, that they fell back upon the darker crimes of which I am speaking"¹
Although Carleton's book was published in Dublin and London, he would have realised that the Irish, who naturally would have been interested in reading a book about themselves, were for the most part too poor to be able to buy it. Hence, he writes his book with a substantial English audience in mind. There are many occasions in his book where one could accuse Carleton of pandering to this audience. As I have highlighted above, Carleton excuses English prejudice which holds the Irish to be mentally deficient as merely the result of linguistic differences. In a more innocuous way, he tries to emphasise our commonalities, rather than our differences. We see this in the way Carleton always uses the word "Christian", instead of the more divisive "Catholic" when discussing the Irish. Also of note, is the number of flattering adjectives he uses to describe the English, for example: "as will always happen with generous people, the one was neither knave nor fool, nor the other churl or a boor."¹, "the immortal bard of Avon"¹, "...I say, should enable a generous people as the English undoubtedly are...", and even, "our literary men followed the example of our great landlords..."¹.
The overall tone of his writing is often a curious mixture of vanity and unconfidence. He rates highly his own contribution to Irish literature, even referring to himself in the 3rd person at one point: "He was not, however, without a strong confidence that notwithstanding the wild and uncleared state of his own country at the time, so far as native literature was concerned, his two little pioneers would work their way with at least moderate success"¹. And at times, he is effusive in his praise for the Irish people. Yet, every time he commends either himself or the Irish, he quickly backpedals with some qualifying remark. For example, he ruminates that his: "vanity [was] high and inflated exactly in proportion to my ignorance"¹, or "God forbid that I for a moment should become the apologist of crime, much less the crimes of my countrymen!"¹ It is as if he is constantly looking towards the English for approval. He is preoccupied with excusing "that portion of our national character which appears worst and weakest in the eyes of our neighbours"¹. Even in his praise for the Irish, he seems to pick out only the virtues which he feels would be palatable to an English audience. Whereas a writer today, when looking back to the turbulence of the 19th century, might praise the Irish's fiery rebelliousness, there is no question of Carleton doing that here.
Although critical of the way Ireland was governed in the past, there is no sense that Carleton feels injustice against the actual principle of English rule in Ireland. While Carleton is culturally radical in the way he extols the virtues of the Irish people, he is politically conservative. He believes that all that is required is for the English landlords to "consider the interests of the tenantry as their own"¹ and that, along with advancements in science and agriculture, is enough for the Irish to become a "prosperous, contented, and great people"¹. One could accuse Carleton of being naive. Was his dream for Ireland's future really feasible without political change? The tragic events of the famine just a few years after the publication of this book appears to prove that his ideas were untenable.

Something which sets Carleton apart from many of the writers of the day (and even today) is the way in which he does not try and cultivate the impression of a "tortured artist". He did not feel like an outsider growing up and he freely admits that he was one of the most popular people in the village. This lies in stark contrast with many of the era's English and French authors, who tended to write extremely ethereal, intellectual works from the point of view of the outsider looking in. In contrast, the folk tales of Ireland have a very physical quality to them (E. Hirsch) and the focus is on their entertainment value. It is clear that Carleton was not overly impressed by pedantic, French intellectuals -"[the Irish sorrow] is not gloom, and for this reason none of those dreary and desponding reactions take place, which, as in France especially, so frequently terminate in suicide"¹ Yet, he wanted to elevate folk tales to the status of literature, to the status of art. Perhaps it is merely coincidence but nevertheless it is worth noting that, in the French visual and poetic arts, there was during this period a great debate between artists of the classical school, and modern artists. The French poet and author, Charles Baudelaire, believed that art should not necessarily be morally instructive, or laden with ideas, but instead should be stripped of everything that was not proper to the art itself. As a consequence, French artists such as Manet began more and more to depict scenes from everyday, peasant life. At the time, France would also have been seen as a very intellectual, highly educated country, but, importantly for an Irishman like Carleton, a country that was not England. Therefore, as a well-read man, it is possible that Carleton was aware of this new French mode of thought and maybe this validated his writing about a peasant culture. Also of interest in this regard is Carlton's attachment to Latin. Although he often uses it purely to show off, and because he needed to learn it to become a priest (a vocation he was considering at one stage) it is important in the sense that it was a kind of universal language with a status to rival English. Was Carleton constantly searching for an intellectual civilisation that wasn't English, one that he could safely admire?
In conclusion, the Introduction to "Traits and Stories of The Irish Peasantry" offers a fascinating glimpse into social and political conflicts during 19th century Ireland. As well as this, it offers the reader an insight into the life of a peasant in pre-famine Ireland, recording a world which was soon to disappear. Whatever your views on Carleton personally and politically, what cannot be doubted is his contribution to Irish literature, paving the way for a whole host of Irish writers who have gone on to achieve world renown.












Bibliography


1. "Traits and Stories of the Irish Peasantry : Volume 1" Author: William Carleton. This edition published by: Colin Smythe Ltd. Place of publication: Buckinghamshire. First published in 1842-44. Reprinted in 2002.
2. "William Carleton: Novelist of the People". Author : Brian Donnelly. From a series of essays published in "Tyrone, History & Society. Series Editor: William Nolan. Publisher: Geography Publications. Year of publication: 2000.
3. "The Imaginary Irish Peasant" Author: Edward Hirsch. Year of Publication 1991. Available from JSTOR.
4. "The Oxford Book of Irish Verse: XVIIth Century-XXth Century." Contributors: Donagh MacDonagh - author, Lennox Robinson - author. Publisher: Clarendon Press. Place of publication: Oxford. Publication Year: 1958.
5. "The Politics of Irish Literature: From Thomas Davis to W. B. Yeats." Contributors: Malcolm Brown - author. Publisher: University of Washington Press. Place of Publication: Seattle. Publication Year: 1973.