I can't edit the text anymore, so: it's of course *way of living + *there are interesting clues..

Zitat von Texas Lennard E. im Beitrag #3

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But how can you say, that they have forgotten what they were fighting for when it is said by Crilly and Skeffington over and over again? They are the IRA, they want to "get the Brits out of Ireland" by the use of violence and whatnot.

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I’d like to explain what I’ve meant because it seems like you don’t got my point.
The aspect you’ve mentioned is right. Crilly and Skeffington do repeat their dogmas over and over again. But as a matter of fact that doesn’t affect my thesis, that today’s participants of the Northern Ireland Conflict “have forgotten what they were fighting for”, that the real reasons for the conflict “got lost”. Repeating hollow phrases (referring to Crilly and Skeffington) like the one you’ve quoted (“[…]get the Brits out of Ireland”) doesn’t mean anything at all. Crilly and Skeffington may believe in their anti-protestant and anti-british ideology but in fact everything they claim has a lack of substantiation. And why is that? Well, as already explained, there once had been reasonable arguments that could at least justify a conflict (needless to say that violence mostly/never isn’t a practicable way to solve problems). In earlier times the Catholics had been exploited and dispossessed by British and Scottish Protestants, who mainly were wealthy industrialists – they’re whole way life living constituted some kind of antagonism to the rural and poor catholic population. However, by now it would be naive and simply wrong to believe that the insistence on archaic ideological aims could help to improve the situation in Northern Ireland in any way.

Just because people like Crilly and Skeffington keep repeating these mantra-like dogmas of “getting the Brits out” it doesn’t mean that they have any historical understanding. Actually it seems to me as if they don’t even know what they are talking about. Our current topic in German classes is language: Pronouncing letters, words, sentences, etc., which itself are meaningless signs, and really understanding them are two complete different things. Think of Skeffington. He internalized the hatred of his father (pp. 16f) – and probably he’s just one example for whole generations of Northern Irish people who “inherited” the great burden of hatred from the original conflict respectively their ancestors. The hatred and the anger developed their own dynamics, became kind of detached from reality until they finally reached their climax in The Troubles. The “infectious” and irrational impact of these emotions is also recognisable in the novel. On page 60, ll. 23f Dunlop tells Cal that he has “nothing against Catholic people” and that “it’s just the religion itself” that he doesn’t like - I believe this quotation describes the situation perfectly. It’s not about people or reasonable arguments anymore, but about irrational ideologies which in fact are the problem itself.

In addition to that the diffuse aimlessness of the hatred gets intensified by the anonymity which dominances the relationship between Catholics and Protestants. I think this problem was basically made clear during our lesson about the peace walls. Nevertheless there interesting clues in the novel as well. Cal’s dream on page 93f, ll. 1ff describes an illusive situation in which people with “domed seamless lids […] instead of eyes” are passing him. The fact that the passers-by don’t have eyes can be interpreted as a symbolization of the harsh anonymity which characterizes the conflict in Northern Ireland.

Even if the situation in Northern Ireland wasn’t such an extreme one, one could still consider the growing of diffuse feelings of hatred without having any reasons given a normal psychological process. From what I know an important source of destructive, irrational feelings like racism is the way of how our brain divides emotional and rational information. For instance, you read something in a newspaper you rather don’t really trust it. There is a compromising headline that creates fear of foreigners. Now, what you may think while reading is “Oh, that’s ridiculous and disgraceful, they don’t have any arguments” – this is the rational part of your brain. However, the emotional aspect of the headline (fear/hatred of foreigners) “infiltrates” your brain on another subtle level and after a while you may have “forgotten” the source of this information and all there is left is an unconscious awkward feeling about foreigners.

If you relate this knowledge to what I’ve said about the hatred and anger in Northern Ireland developing their own dynamics, you may understand what I mean by claiming that the people of Northern Ireland don’t really know what they are fighting for anymore. Of course it’s only a thesis of mine, but I think that there really are some reasonable arguments that support this theory.

I hope you all don’t feel offended because I wrote about you in the third person – it just seemed more appropriate for an objective style.

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Concerning the fundamental question I agree with you all: Cal isn’t a “love story”, it’s about much more than that. However, I have another opinion on the explanation.

Firstly I contradict Berenike’s statement that the love story between Cal and Marcella isn’t “necessary for the main story”. In fact I do think their relationship fulfils an important, indispensable function. It seems like Milena also recognized this supporting function of Cal’s and Marcella’s relationship. She basically got the gist of it, although she didn’t point out the importance of it enough. Furthermore I do not share her opinion about what the main aspect of the novel is and as a consequence thereof I also take a different view on the basic function of their affair. Anyway, to discuss this in a well-founded way it’s necessary to first define what the “main aspect”, the essence of the novel is.

I consider “Cal” as a highly political novel. The goal of it is to give an insight and subjective view of the situation in Northern Ireland by deliberately focusing on one respectively a few person(s). The problems caused by The Troubles are omnipresent, also in Cal’s and Marcella’s relationship which becomes obvious, for instance, on page 135, l.24 when Cal wonders whether he could tell Marcella about his complicity in the murder of her husband without her telling the police. This whole problem has only been induced by the Northern Ireland Conflict and eventually transformed into an obstacle for their relationship.
In addition to that Cal is constantly scared of Crilly, Skeffington and the I.R.A. in general because “they shot deserters” (p. 81, l.19).
Altogether it becomes clear that the affair between Cal and Marcella is extremely affected by the political and social situation in Northern Ireland.

A last supporting aspect for my thesis, that The Troubles and all its consequences are the main theme of the novel, is the description of the story on the back of the book which exclusively focuses on the political situation in Northern Ireland.

Of course the novel deals with other interesting aspects such as the personal psychological development of a young man, namely Cal. Milena believes this to be the “main aspect of the novel”, which is naturally a possible way of interpreting the novel. However, I’m of the opinion that everything that happens in the plot should be contextualized with the Northern Ireland Conflict. It can be taken for granted that the “evolution of Cal/his character”, as Milena expresses it, is of high relevance. But why is it so important? I believe because it enables the reader to understand the impact of the situation in Northern Ireland in a more emotional way. If one reads a factual newspaper article about The Troubles which is filled with statistics, etc., highly emotional issues become abstract and it gets nearly impossible to really relate to the content. So at the bottom line I interpret the novel as a political one.

Now it’s possible to deal with the question of the function of the relationship between Cal and Marcella. As already mentioned I regard it as an indispensable part of the story.
The (sexual motivated) love and desire for another person is one of the human basic needs. Accordingly the acting out of it is from great importance to every human being. The function of a society is to ensure that its people are able to live a life as good as possible (of course there are also other aspects). The combination of these thoughts result in a potential (naturally fragmentary) definition for the value and quality of a society: The value and quality of a society can be measured by the possibilities of acting out the human sexual drive by having a relationship.

This theory came to my mind when I was thinking about the novels 1989 (George Orwell) and Brave New World (Aldous Huxley). First it may be hard to realize the similarities to Cal but in fact the basic structure is alike. Both of these novels are Science-Fiction literature in which the authors created a dystopia. 1989 deals with a surveillance society whereas Brave New World describes a callous engineered society. Anyway, the stories itself don’t matter concerning the analogy to Cal. The main point is that both novels 1989 and Brave New World aren’t “love stories”, though there are (sexual) relationships used to illustrate the spirit and the core of the society the characters live in. In 1989 the protagonist Winston Smith has a love affair which is suppressed and obstructed by the totalitarian regime while the protagonist of Brave New World, Bernard Marx, has to deal with a brainwashed girl and can’t fulfil his wish of having a faithful relationship because the technocratic government forces its citizens to be promiscuous.

The gist of it all is that the reader is able to recognize and understand the character of the society by analyzing the relationships. In both novels the relationship itself becomes a mirror of society.
As already explained above, in the novel “Cal” the pattern is basically the same: The relationship between Cal and Marcella is highly affected by The Troubles and therefore by the condition of the society.
So, concerning Lennard’s question it can be stated that Cal isn’t a “love story”. However, the relationship fulfils an important, indispensable function to illustrate the impact of the Northern Ireland Conflict.

I don’t think that it significantly matters which confession a person in Northern Ireland belongs to. At the bottom line the whole behaviour of the people in the novel is pretty unreligious and arbitrary. “Rain kept the Protestants at home”. By looking at this quotation on page 15, ll. 34f it becomes obvious how cynical the situation in Northern Ireland really is. It has nothing to do with real beliefs – otherwise people, in this case the Protestants - wouldn’t stop the “aggro”, as it is called in the text, and stay home just because it rains. However, there once were real differences between the people of these two confessions in the early days but throughout this long lasting conflict the war subsequently made them equal because it estranged them from their roots.

It’s a normal sociological process that poverty, territorial conflicts, starvation, etc. between two groups lead to stronger emphasis of other differences that can be used to divide the groups – and often one of these differences is the religion.

Basically there are many similarities to typical conflicts in Africa. Starvation, poverty and territorial conflicts build the perfect matrix for making a bogeyman. Frequently another religious group respectively another religion itself is particularly suitable for being a bogeyman. This is why most of the groups and tribes with different religions in Africa lived together in peace for hundreds of years. Then there has been the age of colonization in which the existing structures of the colonized land and society were usually destroyed. After the colonizers left, these destroyed structures (induced by ruthless exploitation) caused extreme poverty, starvation, land conflicts, etc – and suddenly tribes and groups that once had lived peacefully together were in war with each other because of their religion. But as the analysis of the historical development reveals, the religious differences are only a pretext for wars and conflicts which in fact have other reasons.

Referring to Northern Ireland it’s also possible to make out more substantial reasons for the hatred between the two groups of Catholics and Protestants. The Protestants (mainly Scottish and British people) colonized the country. For the most part they were wealthy industrialists whereas the catholic group largely consisted of the poor rural population. In addition to these meaningful differences there also was land grab, especially in the so-called “Plantation of Ulster” from 1602 to 1660, which still coins the structures of Northern Ireland – the highly developed, industrial northeast is mainly populated by the Protestants, the agrarian west is dominated by Catholics.

Concerning “Cal” and the current situation it seems like the people literally have forgotten what they were fighting for. There were, as explained above, real differences between these groups which made them exploit their confessions as a distinctive feature. But throughout the historical development the real reasons got lost and the conflict about the confession, that once had been a pretext, turned into an end in itself. On page 59, ll12f Dunlop seems to faintly realize the original roots of “The Troubles” as he remembers: “For too long the Catholics of Ulster have been the hewers of wood and the drawers of water.”

To finally connect these thoughts with the person of Cal it may be useful to consider the scene on page 31f. Cal is in the Church and simply enjoys feeling Marcella’s “firm haunch” (with the back of his hand). The essence of this scene is: Cal has no regrets about thinking and acting in a sexual way despite him being in a church, a house of god. This and his general behaviour of desiring Marcella and finally even sleeping with her without being married reveals how indifferent he is to the rules of the church.

So all in all it can be stated that there are many well-founded reasons to assume that the confession itself doesn’t really matter. The main motive of both groups is irrational hatred (and not any religious beliefs) which creates a vicious circle that affects both parties the same.

In this interpretation of Cal’s dream on page 28, I want to draw an analogy between Cal, the protagonist, and the girl that occurs in his dream. To do this in a reasonable and comprehensible way it is necessary to first analyze these two characters. The analysis of Cal will be of course focused on the aspects that are relevant for the topic.
Because the dream is a “recurring” (p. 28, l. 6) one, it can be concluded that it has a certain importance.
The girl in the dream is “young” (p.28, l.6). Furthermore she is naked and Cal thinks her beautiful. Also, she feels a strong sexual desire (p. 28, l. 9), which makes her “touch herself” constantly. As she flitters from window to window (p. 28, l. 10) one could assume she’s disorientated, moreover desperate as if she was caged wanting to flee. Her facial expression of “terror” (p. 28, l. 13) and her final suicide support this thesis of her being desperate due to her hopeless situation of being trapped in cage.
Cal, the protagonist, is a young adult living in Northern Ireland (back of the book). During the first part of the story he is unemployed (p. 25, l. 22) and mainly doesn’t know what to do with his life, which is why he is in his room “all the time”, as his father claims (p. 25, l. 21). His homeland, Northern Ireland, is an “entire region of hopelessness” (back of the book) for which the following quotation could be a describing, cynical metaphor out of a subjective perspective: “From a distance the place reeked of urine but when he got inside the stink was overpowering.” (p. 33, ll. 14f) Because of this deep, partly subconscious disgust Cal has for Northern Ireland he develops escapist habits. On page 6, ll. 1f his way of playing the guitar is exposed as an “attempt to rid himself of something”. Even Cal’s habit of cursing in foreign languages can be reduced to his simple urge of escaping out of the harsh reality in Northern Ireland. A possible explanation for this behaviour is that the English swearwords are too strongly associated with the “Troubles” and the conflict in general. In addition to that Cal is fascinated by, as he calls it, the “continent” which may also lead him to the frequent usage of terms like “Cochon” or “merde” (p. 6, ll. 4f).
In brief, it can be stated that Cal wants to flee from reality since he can’t bear the grief, pain and desperation anymore caused by the conflict in Northern Ireland.
In this context his love for Marcella can be considered as something replaceable because it only is the manifestation of his deeper, more abstract desires. First of all he believes her to be a girl from the “continent” (which even makes him “shudder” (p. 23, l. 14)). Secondly, and this is probably more important, Marcella is an outlet and target for his sexual drive which enables him to flee from reality by focusing on sexuality. His sexual desire for her becomes obvious several times. For instance, when he’s observing her through the bathroom window feeling a voyeuristic pleasure (pp. 80, ll. 1ff). On page 32, ll. 4f Cal gets pushed against Marcella and is simply enjoying it. This pattern, escaping into sexuality, is typical for Northern Ireland and it's youth: Throughout “The Troubles” there have been significant raises in the rates of illegitimate births and the sexual activity of young people generally increased. The historian Jack Holland calls this a “confused hedonism”(Wikipedia.com) and explains the enormous impact with the previous strict sexual morality in Northern Ireland.
However, finally these escaping methods aren’t enough for Cal and he willingly let’s himself get caught by the police (pp. 135f, ll. 1ff) presumably secretly hoping that they will beat him to death. So this can be considered as an attempted suicide.
My interpretive hypothesis is that the girl occurring in Cal’s dream is an allegory of Cal’s soul, of his deepest feelings. Her disorientation represents the young, unemployed Cal who doesn’t know what to do with his life surrounded by the hopelessness of Northern Ireland. Just as her Cal feels caged in a scenery full of grief and desperation and wants to escape – he mentally marvels at the outside world, the “continent”, while she flitters form window to window to stare out of them. Besides, both of them try to escape into sexuality. Cal craves for consolation by fantasizing about Marcella in a sexual way (and finally even realizes these thoughts), whereas the girl in his dream shows her sexual desire by walking around naked and “touching herself” (p. 28, l. 10). However, both of these behavioural patterns are only manifestations of Cal’s “attempt(s) to rid himself of something” (p. 6, ll. 1f). And in both cases it eventually culminates in the ultimate escapist action: the (at least attempted) suicide. The reader doesn’t know what finally happens to them, the girl is screaming “unceasingly” (p. 28, l. 16) and Cal will at the minimum be beaten “to within an inch of his life” (p. 136, ll. 3f), but this doesn’t matter for the interpretation anyway. The important aspect is that they both wanted to die because of the hopeless and desperate situation they were in – the death was the only remaining escape for them.
All in all there are many reasons to consider the girl occurring in Cal’s dream an allegory of his soul. In addition to that the proceedings in the dream can be seen as an augury for the whole story.