IN his introduction to Phoenix Irish Short Stories, David Marcus outlines the value of this proposed annual collection, not only for the publication of stories by established names, but alongside them, the work of new talents.
"Understandably, publication gives an incalculable boost to a new or fairly new writer's confidence and future, but the literary environment in which his or her work appears must be of equal importance."
There are 23 writers in the collection and the overall standard is high, with the writing ranging across the devilment of John F. Deane to the spikiness of Julia O'Faolain and the lyricism of David Murphy. The varied prose styles are set off by tight editing.
The writers deal with exuberant sex, love and the death of love, marriage (nearly all are again it) food, drink (and the damage of it), music, and words. In "Watling Street Bridge", Keith Ridgway crystallises the wretched disintegration of a man who has left his lover.
His boss tries to help, to talk, but there is nothing in the language of business that allows an explanation I knew that he was reaching out a hand, in his way. But there are different languages in our lives. On one extreme there is the language of the workplace, and on the other there is the language of our hearts."
Margaret Liston's story "Bread I Said" deals with how a name can shape a life, and of how a parent's fate has an automatic effect on a child. The husband in the story wants their unborn baby to be named in honour of his mother. "I wanted to tell him that there was something soft and corpulent about the name Macy ... Like bread promising a forlorn sort of destiny, imbued with a need for fleshy things."
To stop him, she hurt him with words. He pleads. "If you loved me But I did. It wasn't a question of love, but a question of words that were now deceiving us, were playing us like pawns on a chessboard, were creating the dividing lines, black and white, fencing our playing fields."
The writers barely touch on the old enemies in Irish writing church and state. Instead, the stories are filled with explorations of the human spirit and, predominantly, compassion for human failure. There is a refreshing absence of cynicism in this collection, although plenty of bite.
William Trevor's couple in "Marrying Damian" fret over the impending disastrous marriage of their young daughter to their "old reprobate" friend "There was no point in saying, either, that the damage we already sensed would become entertainment for other people, as damage had for us.
This is a balanced selection of writing while some stories are slighter than others, and lucidity is not yet in every writer's gift, the commitment to craft is universal. These stories are the best kind of holiday reading, imaginative, intellectual exercises while the body is prostrate.
So much life and imagery is crowded into a small space Clare Boylan's Kathleen in "Thatcher's Britain" bought some flowers to comfort herself and to "draw the eye away from the wicked little sink with its pipes exposed, like a spiteful beggar showing off his deformities". Ursula de Brun in "Life in a Cracked Cup" reveals what really goes on in those Fads classes.
The editor of the anthology invites stories for consideration for future volumes David Marcus, PO Box 4937, Rathmines, Dublin 6.
