King Goshawk und die Vögel

by Eimar O'Duffy, Gabriele Haefs (Translator)

Ein Mann, ein Wort - King Goshawk hat Guzzelinda alle Singvögel der Welt versprochen, und die soll sie auch bekommen. Warum er das kann? Weil er der reichste Mann der Welt ist. Wer fortan ein Vögelchen singen hören will, muss dafür bezahlen. Nur einem geht das gründlich gegen den Strich, und der, da von den Menschen keine Hilfe zu erwarten ist, ruft einen sagenhaften keltischen Krieger herbei, der antritt, um die Singvögel - und die Welt - zu retten. So beginnt Eimar O'Duffys sprachmächtige, urkomische Satire auf eine Welt, die einem bedenklich bekannt vorkommt. Satire oder Science Fiction? Natürlich beides. Vor allem aber köstliche Unterhaltung, entdeck und erstmals übersetzt von Gabriele Haefs. (Klappentext)

Genres: Fiction, Ireland, Novels

276 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1926

About the author

It can sometimes seem that Eimar O’Duffy (1893-1935) is most remembered for being a forgotten writer. John Hogan begins his slim 1972 biography of O’Duffy with the line “Eimar Ultan O’Duffy is virtually a forgotten writer”, then quotes Vivian Mercier’s 1946 essay on O’Duffy: “The late Eimar O’Duffy . . . was simply ignored.”

O'Duffy, of Anglo-Irish stock, became a captain in the Irish Volunteers and was sent by Eoin MacNeill, along with Bulmer Hobson, to stop the 1916 insurrection in Belfast. He wrote a wide variety of books and plays, but it is the Cuanduine trilogy that is his great achievement. King Goshawk and the Birds is the first part of the trilogy and is an important landmark in the Irish comic novel tradition.

(From the Irish Times)

Reviews

[Paul Dembina · Rating 5 out of 5]

What an absolute gem. A 100 year old comic novel from an unknown (to me at least) Irish author satirising the disparity between the ultra-rich and the common folks.

Unfortunately a lot of this still rings very true today - some things never seem to change

This is the 1st of a series of 3 novels so I'll be hunting down the other 2 for sure

[MJ Nicholls · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eimar O’Duffy, one of Dalkey Archive’s finest finds this year, was a satirical novelist whose Cuanduine trilogy (this is part one), sent up the ravages of capitalism with full-toothed fervour. In this opener, we are introduced to the Dublin philosopher who summons the mythical hero Cuanduine from the heavens to help in returning the wildflowers and songbirds to the land, having been purchased by the swine King Goshawk for his Melania Trump. The naive hero’s attempts to fathom the moral crookedness and wretched nature of the human enterprise as he cosies into his borrowed body bring forth hard chuckles. O’Duffy’s cutting wit is Flann-strength and the evergreen evil of his topic makes this novel entirely contemporary, in spite of the remarkable publishing date of 1926(!). The book is also a feast of playful play, with O’Duffy parodying newspaper columns, inventing new Irish myths, poking a toe out the fourth wall, and revelling in the vicious vamp of language. A poor proofreading and unremarkable formatting job from the publisher fail to halt the hurt of this fine satire.

[Max Nemtsov · Rating 5 out of 5]

Мениппова сатира — жанр, наверное, навеки любимый, а еще лучше — если она с идиосинкратической причудью, как в Ирландии (хотя, казалось бы, куда причудливей). Но в Ирландии просто, видимо, климат влияет на ветвистость высказываний и строительство вербальных замков. Трилогия О’Даффи – его магнум опус — как раз такова, и проблема у нее всего одна: она не так игрива, как лучшие тексты ФОБ или Мервина Уолла, это Серьезная Сатира, в духе декана Суифта, чьим продолжателем и был ЭОД.
Но в этом и кроется прелесть: как только поймаешь обстоятельный мифогенный строй его речи (странице к 40-й), все становится просто прекрасно: он держит покерфейс всю дорогу, описывая даже самые незначительные обстоятельства жизни и перипетии сюжета с помпезной неторопливостью (не говоря уже о редакционных отступлениях и политических комментариях). Любимый пассаж: две страницы армагеддона кровяных клеток с подробностями, которые завершаются резюме: «Кровь у него свернулась от ужаса». Вишенка на торте для любителей жанровой хряпы — действие первого романа трилогии происходит в альтернативной вселенной лет через 40 после Великой войны, которая пошла не совсем так, как описано в учебниках истории. Про разные планы бытия и планеты я уже не говорю.

[🐴 🍖]

owns owns owns. hard to believe dalkey didn't already unearth this back in the tan covers era! it's the bill & ted's excellent adventure of irish menippean satire, cartoonish in the best possible way but also scalding w/r/t the ways in which humanity fails to be excellent to one another -- wealth inequality, boneheaded nationalism, triangulating journos, decorum-mongerers, &c. &c. (plus sort of a mordant recurring counterpoint asking whether satire can effect change or if it's doomed to get coopted by the existing power structure, which is uncomfortable to consider but a worthwhile convo i think.) as noted infra (or maybe supra? i never know where gr's gonna put these) there's a serious typo situation -- looks like bad OCR that was never corrected. along with ishmael reed's latest being listed on their site as "forthcoming" months after it came out, i worry whether all is well dalkwise, but at any rate can't wait to tackle spacious adventures of the man in the street!!

[Jacob Howard · Rating 4 out of 5]

more irish excellence decrying the lack of irish excellence!

[Chris Leathley · Rating 4 out of 5]

A book of scabrous satire and imaginative dystopia, each stroke of the irreverent pen by O’Duffy in ‘King Goshawk and the Birds’ sends barbs towards dozens of deserving targets - capitalism; religion; social prudery; jingoistic pride; and more besides. He utilises the mythology of old but in a way that is less obscure, less dense with abstract experiment than other more celebrated authors. As such, this makes it both more immediately and uproariously funny but it also makes it slightly less immersive or engaging. Still, it remains a fine book that takes no prisoners and is, depressingly, even more relevant in our hyper-capitalist world.

[Thomas · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can see how O'Duffy became an overlooked writer, if I can make that judgment based on one book. King Goshawk is a very funny, extremely entertaining and at times acerbic poke at capitalism that has not weakened over time. Narratively it has some rough edges, but for a story that is mostly concerned with the fictional son of a mythological Irish character it is surprisingly relevant and contemporary. Fans of Flann O'Brien, James Stephens, et al., should definitely sample a dram from this barrel.

[Caroline]

Reading a Century Project 1926

[Laurel · Rating 5 out of 5]

Eimar O’Duffy wrote this book in 1926 and it is as relevant today as it must have been in the author’s time. Like his countryman, Jonathan Swift, O’Duffy creates a dystopian fable as a comment on his contemporary world. At the time of publication, the Irish had just come through World War One and the War of Independence that yielded the Anglo-Irish Treaty. O’Duffy utilized fiction as a device to question contemporary politics and the price of freedom. He created a fable, on the basis of a most ludicrous project of an out of touch king, to gather and cage in his palatial gardens, all songbirds. The king’s project a reflection of exclusive pleasure of the greedy royal and his consort. A wise and frustrated philosopher seeks resolution by resorting to Irish mythology, he entreats a warrior god, not so much to be the people’s saviour, but to remind and reinvigorate the people who share a noble and heroic ancestry. O’Duffy included some hilarious newspaper excerpts that satirize both political emphasis and media headlines, ie ‘King saves his hat from blowing off by reaching up with his own fingers.’ The writing is wonderful. Clear, jocular, and vividly descriptive. Highly recommended!

[Jonathan yates · Rating 5 out of 5]

Holy hell, this was incredibly entertaining, it’s actually kind of sad how a 100 year old social satire about the evils of capitalism is so incredibly relevant, I hope that this book is eventually irrelevant politically, then it can just be read as a comedy cause it’s hilarious