Inishbream
by Theresa Kishkan
Goose Lane Editions, 2001
Reviewed by Robert LeBlanc
A cold mist drifts over the waves, caressing a skin-hulled currach as it
navigates the depths of the North Atlantic swells that separate the Irish
coast from Inishbream. A solitary figure sits at the boat's oars. It is St.
Brendan, come to the stone's past Ireland's end on his journey to find the
world beyond the rolling grey ocean; yet at the same time it is the author,
making her way back to the lichen coated cottage she has decided to call
home.
It is forgivable if the reader believes that Inishbream, Theresa Kishkan's
novella, is an autobiographical account of the year she spent on a small
island off Ireland's west coast. Kishkan's memories must be vivid indeed,
for she creates a maritime world that penetrates the reader like the chill
that rolls in from the North Atlantic, crippling joints long before the
vigour of youth has left. The fresh, salty air that stings your eyes and
burns your lungs, the cry of seabirds and the groan of the ocean, the
shifting shades of grey from the ever present mist to wet stone: Kishkan
takes the images engraved on her mind and lyrically implants them into the
reader's consciousness.
Wandering far from her Canadian homeland to find herself, a young woman
completes a journey of emotional upheaval and growth in the time that
Kishkan allots her on Inishbream. Finding the solitude she so strongly
desires on the Irish island, the young woman narrator struggles to do what
is expected, aspires to lose her foreignness and become an islander herself.
This self-imposed metamorphosis is evident in the narrator's mannerisms,
habits and speech: each slowly adapts to the surrounding world as the book
progresses. The supporting characters themselves are an integral part of the
primitive background, remaining, as they have for generations, unchanged in
the face of nature's harsh rhythms. The narrator realizes, through her own
observations, that she can never be of Inishbream: she
is never offered the brown mug of local tea, is always being watched, and
suffers continual chastisement for being different from the other island
women.
The isolation of Inishbream allows Kishkan to develop controlled studies of
broader social questions. The ever-present ogre of racism finds its way into
the quiet fishing community on Ireland's west coast. The narrator is quite
aware of the islanders' mistrust of foreigners, especially of those who
refuse to fit into their ideals. In a much subtler fashion, this xenophobia
manifests itself in the stereotypes abounding in the mind and on the lips of
Sean, the narrator's island husband, as he expounds upon his suspicions
about the caravan of Tinkers that seasonally passes through the pastures of
the Irish mainland opposite Inishbream.
As the novella moves towards its inevitable conclusion, the men and women of
Inishbream find themselves leaving the salt water that has flowed through
their veins since the beginning of their collective memory for a new life in
modern homes on the mainland. The island folk promise to continue steering
their currachs out to their nets and lobster pots, but the narrator
perceives their future as desolate in their new and foreign surroundings.
Not wanting to take part in the death of Inishbream, the narrator seizes
upon this opportunity to cut herself from the people who have housed her,
yet never really welcomed her.
Inishbream is written with a poet's soft cadence, and lulls the reader into
the comfort of a cable-knit sweater perfumed by sweet pipe tobacco. Kishkan
intertwines Ireland's and Canada's disparate cultures, each land culled from
the harshness of sea and earth. With the deft skill of a fisherman in his
skin-covered currach, Kishkan delivers a world of simple beauty, both real
and mythical.
Robert LeBlanc lives, writes and reads in small town Ontario, co-editing the
"The Ultimate Hallucination" (http://members.home.net/breeno/ultimatehallucination.html). |
