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Overview
Fleeing the Irish Republican paymasters for whom he committed murder and mayhem, Henry Smart has left his wife and infant daughter in Dublin and is off to start a new life. When he lands in America, it is 1924 and New York City is the center of the universe. Henry turns to hawking cheap hooch on the Lower East Side, only to catch the attention of the mobsters who run the district. In Chicago, Henry finds a newer America alive with wild, happy music played by a man with a trumpet and bleeding lips called Louis Armstrong. But in a city also owned by the mob, Armstrong is a prisoner of his color. He needs a man--a white man--and the man he chooses is Henry Smart.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781440622670 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Penguin Publishing Group |
| Publication date: | 10/25/2005 |
| Series: | The Last Roundup , #2 |
| Sold by: | Penguin Group |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 384 |
| File size: | 405 KB |
| Age Range: | 18 Years |
About the Author
Read an Excerpt
I could bury myself in New York. I could see that from the boat as it went under the Statue of Liberty on a cold dawn that grew quickly behind me and shoved the fog off the slate-coloured water. That was Manhattan, already towering over me. It made tiny things of the people around me, all gawking at the manmade cliffs, and the ranks of even higher cliffs behind them, stretching forever into America and stopping their entry. I could see the terror in their eyes.
I could stare into the eyes without fear of recognition. They weren’t Irish faces and it wasn’t Irish muck on the hems of their greatcoats. Those coats had been dragged across Europe. They were families, three and four generations of them; the Irish travelled alone. There were the ancient women, their faces collapsed and vicious, clutching bags they’d carried across the continent, full of string and eggshells and stones from the walls of lost houses. And their husbands behind them, hidden by beards, their eyes still young and fighting. They guarded the cases and boxes at their feet. And their sons and daughters, grandsons and granddaughters, under embroidered scarves and black caps, and younger children still, and pregnant girls with scrawny boys standing and sitting beside them, all cowed by the approaching city cliffs. Even the youngest sensed that their excitement was unwanted and stayed silent, as the Reliance sent small waves against Bedloe’s Island and the big stone American woman – send these, the homeless, tempest-tost to me – as their parents and grandparents shivered at the new world and tried to know if they were looking at its front or back. I was the only man alone, the only man not afraid of what was growing up in front of us. This was where a man could disappear, could die if he wanted to, and come back to quick, big life.
I had arrived.
But we turned from Manhattan and sailed, almost back into the night, towards the New Jersey shore. And the silence around me fell deeper as the island crept up in front of us. The last few square feet of the old, cruel world, the same name in all the languages on board as we were pulled closer and closer, isola delle lagrime, Tränen Insel, the isle of tears. Ellis Island.
Hundreds of shuffling feet trapped under the vaulted ceiling of the great hall, the air was full of the whispers of the millions who’d passed through, the cries of the thousands who’d been stopped and sent back. I listened for the tap of a famous leg, but I heard none. Old men tried to straighten long-crooked backs and mothers rubbed rough colour into the white cheeks of their children. Wild men ran fingers through long beards and regretted that they hadn’t shaved before they’d disembarked. Jewish women caressed sons’ ringlets and tried to push them under hats. Fragments of new language were tried, and passed from mouth to mouth.
—Yes, sir.
—No, sir.
—My cousin, he have a house.
—I am a farmer.
—Qu-eeeens.
The medical inspector stared into my eyes. I knew what he was looking for. I’d been told all about it, by a lame and wheezy anarchist who was making his seventh try at landing.
—They see the limp but never the brain, he’d said. —The fools. When they confront the fact that I am too dangerous for their country, then I will happily turn my back on it. But, until then, I commute between Southampton and their Ellis Island.
—If you could afford first or second class, I told him, —you wouldn’t have to set foot on the island.
—You think I am not aware of this? he said. —I can afford it. But I won’t afford it.
The inspector was looking for signs of trachoma in my eyes, and for madness behind them. He couldn’t stare for long – no one could; he saw nothing that was going to send me back. To my left, another inspector drew a large L on a shoulder with a brand new piece of chalk. L was for lung. I knew the signs; I’d been seeing them all my life. The man with the brand new L had already given up. He collapsed and coughed out most of his remaining life. He had to be carried away. An E on the shoulder meant bad eyes, another L meant lameness. And behind those letters, other hidden letters, never chalked onto shoulders: J for too Jewish, C for Chinese, SE, too far south and east of Budapest. H was for heart, SC was for scalp, X was for mental.
And H was for handsome.
The guards stood back and I walked the few steps to the next desk. I let my heels clip the Spanish tiles. Two beautiful sisters held each other as they were pushed back. Without parents or children they were too likely to fall into bad hands waiting for them on the Manhattan or New Jersey wharfs. If they were lucky they’d be kept on the island until relatives were found to take them; less lucky, they’d be pawed, then let through; less lucky still, they’d be deported, sent back before they’d arrived.
I handed my passport and papers to the Immigration Bureau officer. He opened the passport and found the ten-dollar note I’d left in its centre. The note was gone before I saw it missing. I’d taken it from the wheezy anarchist; its loss didn’t sting. Then came the catechism, the questions I couldn’t get wrong.
—What is your name?
—Henry Drake.
—Where are you from?
—London.
—Why have you come to the United States?
—Opportunity.
So far, so easy.
But he stopped. He looked at me.
—Where are you travelling from, sir? he asked me.
It wasn’t one of the questions.
—London, I said.
He seemed to be staring at the word as I spoke it.
—You are a born Englishman, sir?
He read my latest name.
—Mister Drake?
—Yes.
—Henry Drake.
—Yes.
—And where is Missis Drake, sir?
—She’s in my dreams.
—So you’re travelling alone, sir, is that right? You are an unmarried man.
—That’s right.
—And how do you intend supporting yourself, sir?
We were back on track.
—By working very hard.
—Yes, and how, sir?
—I’m a salesman.
—And your speciality?
I shrugged.
—Everything, and anything.
—Alright. And do you have sufficient funds to sustain you until you commence selling everything?
—I do.
He handed me a sheet of paper.
—Could you read this for me, sir?
—We, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union—
And as I strolled through the literacy test, I could feel Victor, my brother, beside me, his leg pressed against mine in the school desk, and Miss O’Shea at my shoulder, my teacher and wife, the mother of the daughter I suddenly missed, her wet fingers on my cheek.
—and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution of—
He took the paper from my fingers. He picked up a rubber stamp and brought it down on top of a card. I read the stamp: ADMITTED.
—Welcome to America, he said.
What People are Saying About This
"The action is fast, the language authentic and earthy... Henry Smart may not be admirable, but he is unforgettable." —The Boston Globe
"The terse, slang-studded rhythms of Doyle’s prose have a striking musicality... A remarkable performance in language. —Chicago Tribune
"Doyle is arguably the finest fiction writer to emerge from Ireland since World War II." —The Denver Post
"Together, [A Star Called Henry and Oh, Play That Thing] constitute one of the most remarkable achievements in recent irish and American literature." —The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Reading Group Guide
INTRODUCTION
With his sequel to A Star Called Henry, Roddy Doyle continues the story of the infamous yet irresistible Henry Smart. An extraordinary man to be sure, Henry is also every man who ever hoped for a different kind of life and a better future.
When Oh, Play That Thing opens it is 1924, and Henry is sailing into New York Harbor. His job in Dublin now finished, this is Henry's chance for a fresh start, to leave his murderous past behind and begin life anew: "America was everything possible," he says.
Indeed, things for Henry do start out with promise. His many "talents" combined with his unsurpassed survival instinct make finding work easy—the hard part is staying out of trouble. Despite his desire for a fresh start, Henry is unable to keep the dark side of the world at bay and soon realizes that leaving Dublin was not the end of his running but the beginning, as he enters a race against time for his own survival.
Henry moves from place to place, making one narrow escape after another, always landing on his feet and reinventing himself each time. In Chicago, he befriends the great Louis Armstrong, on the cusp of stardom, and becomes Armstrong's "white man." When the "hard guys" are on his heels again, he returns to New York—Harlem this time—still at Armstrong's side. But the ghosts of Henry's past just won't let go, and before long he's on the run again, crisscrossing America in pursuit of his life, his liberty, and his elusive wife, Miss O'Shea.
Telling Henry's epic story in his distinctive, captivating writing style, Roddy Doyle takes us breathlessly and effortlessly between two worlds, the Dublin of Henry's past and the cities and towns of America—very different places yet ironically very much the same. As Henry discovers, you can leave a place, but your past comes along with you.
ABOUT RODDY DOYLE
Roddy Doyle is an internationally bestselling writer. His first three novels—The Commitments, The Snapper, and the 1991 Booker Prize finalist The Van—are known as The Barrytown Trilogy. He is also the author of the novels Paddy Clarke Ha Ha Ha (1993 Booker Prize winner), The Woman Who Walked into Doors, and A Star Called Henry, and a non-fiction book about his parents, Rory & Ita. Doyle has also written for the stage and the screen: the plays Brownbread, War, Guess Who's Coming for the Dinner, and The Woman Who Walked Into Doors; the film adaptations of The Commitments )as co-writer), The Snapper, and The Van; When Brendan Met Trudy (an original screenplay); the four-part television series Family for the BBC; and the television play Hell for Leather. Roddy Doyle has also written the children's books The Giggler Treatment, Rover Saves Christmas, and The Meanwhile Adventures and contributed to a variety of publications including The New Yorker magazine and several anthologies. He lives in Dublin.
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
Foreword
1. Roddy Doyle says he avoids lengthy descriptions in his books and tries to let the characters speak for themselves. “I’ve always liked brilliant dialogue, in Elmore Leonard, in Flannery O’Connor, anywhere where you can tell as soon as the characters open their mouths where they’re from... I just wanted to record the sound of the talk.” Discuss the voices in Oh, Play That Thing and how well Doyle reveals the interior language of his protagonist.
2. “I love Peter Carey’s book Illywhacker and Günter Grass’s The Tin Drum,” says Roddy Doyle. “These are books that left a very lasting impression on me. And indeed Midnight’s Children and Shame, the Salman Rushdie novels, made a very lasting impression on me. And they may have been at the back of my mind when I was starting this book.” Some people have said Roddy Doyle was telling the history of twentieth-century Ireland in A Star Called Henry, as William Boyd told a story of the twentieth century in Any Human Heart. Discuss the interplay of real history and individual character in Oh, Play That Thing.
3. In A Star Called Henry, Henry Smart is larger than life, and Doyle steps away from the realism of his previous books to experiment with plot. “I wanted impossible things to mix with possible, real and fictional people to shake hands . . . I wanted to have fun. I wanted to go over the top.” While it is not as overtly experimental, would you describe Oh, Play That Thing as over the top, and if so, why and what does this effect achieve?
4. Roddy Doyle has in the pastreceived criticism in Ireland for his raw portrayal of working-class northside Dublin, for giving the country a bad image; especially with a brutally frank film about domestic abuse called The Family, which was watched by half the adult population in Ireland nevertheless. Bearing in mind that one of Doyle’s favourite authors is Elmore Leonard, discuss sex and violence in Oh, Play That Thing.
5. As a child, Roddy Doyle has said he was never a fighter but survived by using humour to save himself. “I used to compose silly songs about people, give them nicknames, things like that.” Discuss his use of language and the sense of humour in this book.