At the West Cork Literary Festival in Bantry, Co. Cork, Ireland in July, I attended a fascinating talk with guest author Richard Kearney, who discussed his new novel, Salvage (Arrowsmith Press, 2023). Flor MacCarthy facilitated a good discussion in a packed church with Professor Kearney of Boston College, a well-respected philosopher and Irish folklorist, and author of over thirty books. Salvage is Kearney’s third novel. During the Q&A part of the program, I asked Prof. Kearney to talk about his process—how, in crafting the lead character of Maeve O’Sullivan, a teenaged girl, whose traditional ecological knowledge (TEK) of plants is extensive—whether Prof. Kearney has this traditional knowledge himself, or had he conducted some qualitative research? And if so, how did he go about doing this? He explained that it was a combination of both things—for one, he conducted research over ten years for this book. A chance meeting in New York City with a woman who was among the last inhabitants to leave the little-known island in West Cork (around the time of the Titanic; luckily, she missed that boat!) inspired Kearney to begin to “salvage” bits and pieces of stories, family names, and history. That research, in combination with his own knowledge of the geography and the landscape, especially the Beara and Sheep’s Head peninsulas, having grown up in West Cork, steered Kearney in crafting this marvelous novel. It really is a wonderful story! I loved it.
Set in coastal south West Cork, Ireland on Brigid’s Island in 1939-1942, this novel is a coming-of-age story that centers around young Maeve O’Sullivan, her family, her friends, and her community. Swirling with Irish folklore of seaweed, mushrooms and marsh plants, the reader plunges right into Maeve’s coastal island world: she knows the names of fish in Irish and English; she knows the “healing power of meadowsweet,” (p. 132) , the turning of tides, that “turbulent unsteady tápholl where swells met and went in opposite directions,” (p. 83) and the island birds by name, by call, by their flight patterns, like the gannet, and storm petrels, that “love wild seas, big rollers, stormy weather.” (170) She mixes cures for her mother’s sadness, born out of the legends of Cliona, and the loss of those who’ve drowned at sea in boating accidents.
Her father has taught her “[s]ecret things of the secret healers. An t-aos Sí and the sidhe draoi.” (p. 62) She believes in Brigid, the saint, the goddess, the healer, and the cures in her father’s book connected to Brigid’s well. She knows how to mix her own “island ingredients” like duileasc and carraigín—dulse and Irish moss, to cure different ailments or illnesses. (147) Maeve believes that “God heals things. He works through saints like Brigid and through cures, using ordinary things like water and plants. Brigid is in water and plants. She is the water and plants.” (161) At school, Maeve’s first day is fraught with a mix of embarrassment and shame, harassment or bullying from her classmates, as Maeve is extremely poor, and her father’s death was surrounded by so much trauma and loss in the community. Yet Maeve is eager to learn. She wants to attend school (and to learn English.) Her teacher, Miss Collins, gives a lesson one day on Saint Brigid. “‘Today we’ll learn about Saint Brigid. I hear there’s been talk, and it’s important to get things right.’ She held up a book called Lives of Ancient Irish Saints. ‘I am writing a lesson on the board now and I want you all to copy it down.’ […] The girls bent their heads and transcribed the fluent letters. Brigid was a Celtic goddess of three wisdoms—poetry, healing and smithcraft. She was called an ‘ancient bride of nature’ and later became a Christian saint. Brigid was a mixture of legend and history. […] She could make wells rise up by planting a staff in the ground. A few of these wells still exist in Ireland and are known as Brigid’s Wells. Brigid’s Island—Oileán Bhride—is one of those places.” (p. 79-80) Miss Collins goes on to tell the class that Maeve has come from Brigid’s Island. This is one of several turning points for Maeve in school; she trusts and admires Miss Collins, whose unwavering affection and encouragement carries straight through to the end of the story.
Friendship and love combine with Maeve’s traditional knowledge as lovely vessels to hold and carry the story as she grows into her teens. Maeve comes of age at an interesting and tumultuous period of Irish and European history as the Irish Rail system brings the trains to Cork; WWII has just begun. When Maeve goes to the mainland school, she begins a nuanced friendship with Helen, a local girl whose parents own a store and have the one telephone in the village. Helen comes from privilege and the two girls’ family lives and backgrounds are a stark contrast. Despite their differences, they both fall for the same boy, Seamus Kennedy, or develop “first love” crushes. Seamus’ father is Dr. Kennedy, and it’s clear that Seamus is likely to follow in his father’s footsteps into the study of medicine. Seamus has a more worldly perspective, having come from England and Dublin; he has a driver’s license and sails. What’s really most impressive to Maeve is his clear connection to the water. He’s a good swimmer and when she looks at his face, she sees the sea in his blue eyes. Just like her father.
When she interacts with the Kennedy family, she is excited to share Seamus’ mother’s interest in plants. But they differ on one important topic: fungi. Maeve’s knowledge of fungi—Púcaí, mushrooms, differs from the facts in Mrs. Kennedy’s guidebook to British Flora and Fungi. Maeve brightly tells the Kennedy family about her favorites, Púcaí poill, or Bia Bhríde, “Brigid’s food,” which are “grand for cures. Especially for moods,” (131) but then Mrs. Kennedy tells her she’s wrong; they’re poisonous. In an effort to avoid an argument (whether to avoid embarrassment in front of Seamus, or to be polite), Maeve doesn’t argue the point but quietly thinks to herself, no, these mushrooms aren’t poisonous; her father taught her how to identify the pucaí. Maeve’s conversations with various characters, the Kennedys and Helen’s family, the Flynns, and Father Kehoe, and others, demonstrate this undercurrent of tension between the folklore behind the traditional knowledge of plants, and the growing interest in westernizing (English) many facets of daily Irish life. Along with Maeve’s friends from the mainland, the reader learns parts of the Irish language for plants, birds, wildlife, aspects of the sea and island life. One of my favorite elements of this book is the piecing together of language–specifically, the Irish language, one that Prof. Kearney thought about as another form of ‘salvage.’
Maeve experiences that tension within herself, too, as she is pulled in different directions—does she choose to move fully into the modern world, and leave the Irish folklore and faith around her beliefs in Brigid behind her? Professor Kearney taps into a rich folkloric wellspring of source material for this unique novel. I wholeheartedly recommend this novel to anyone interested in plants, placed-based ethnography, Irish and Celtic folklore, Traditional Knowledge of plants (or Traditional Medicine), and Irish history, and Gaelic wisdom of the natural world.
While I stayed in West Cork for seven weeks, as a Visiting Research Scholar at UCC, I drove along the Ring of Beara, visiting heritage sites, such as the Ogham Stone and the Hag of Beara. I also explored the Sheep’s Head and Mizen Head peninsulas. Swimming in a protected cove in Dunmanus Bay, looking out across to Sheep’s Head, and swimming at Barleycove, at both low and high tides, during different tidal conditions, and snorkeling in a part of the Bantry Bay kelp forest off the Beara Peninsula–offered time to reflect on Maeve’s connection to the water, and to Brigid. For me, it was transformational, and very healing on a profoundly personal level. My experiences with the natural world in West Cork, whether at a waterfall in Glengarriff Wood Nature Reserve, or walking along a sheep’s path on the sea-swept Whiddy Island, gave me just a glimpse, even if imaginatively so, into Maeve’s world of Brigid’s Island, and her love for the sea around her. The ending of the novel, in particular, made my heart sing; as an open-water swimmer, I just felt flooded with pure joy and exultation as though I’d realized there was a part of Maeve inside myself all along. Perhaps you’d feel a similar wave of joy reading this book, too. And as a final note, it’s not possible to visit Brigid’s Island today as it’s protected and private. However, it’s possible to visit Whiddy Island and Garnish Island, and other islands in West Cork, Ireland by means of a short ferry ride. I will share more about my experiences on both of these islands, and with the Bantry Bay Kelp Forest initiative, and Glengarriff Wood Nature Reserve in future posts.
Above all else, I found it a very healing book to read. I couldn’t help but be more mindful about plants, foods, ingredients: I shopped for herbal remedies, like tinctures (to add to my tea) at an apothecary in the English Market in Cork; in Bantry, I found all sorts of seaweed-based remedies and products at the farmer’s market and Organico. I read it while I was staying in West Cork in May-July, after picking up my copy at Bantry Books.
Strange Wetlands™ 