A wonderful talent died.
Brendan Behan was a force of nature!
He left behind a small but brilliant body of work..a few plays, a couple of novels, some observations on Ireland, New York plus a miscellany of short stories based mainly on the colourful characters one meets in the public houses of Ireland.
For anybody who has not discovered his work. Read “Borstal Boy” first. It is simply one of the most human and humane pieces of prose committed to paper.
Behan was paranoid about being found out. He felt he had no talent and his luck would run out. People would discover that his maverick genius would be declared a fake. He tormented himself with this fear and hid it from the world with a sham air of drunken belligerence.
There is a link with my family which I will not divulge here. My parents remember him well.
He died 6 months before I entered the world. Alcohol and diabetes had destroyed his small but ample frame.
I’ll write more on the laughing boy soon and indeed his contemporaries who are sadly overlooked by the Intelligentsia on both sides of the Atlantean pond. It’s late and I’ve yet to arrange travel for my clan to the windy city.
(c) deadlydesh2005
