Star of the Sea [Paperback]

Tragedy is a word too often used. Nevertheless, in Star of the Sea Joseph O'Connor manages to achieve a real sense of the tragic, as personal dramas of the most distressing kind play themselves out against the background of the Irish potato famine and the almost equal nightmare of the mass emigration that it caused. As passengers die of starvation and disease in steerage, a drama of adultery, inadvertent incest and inherited disease plays itself out in first class. O'Connor raises, and does not attempt definitively to answer, real questions about responsibility and choice.

Bankrupt aristocrat Meredith is emigrating, pursued by the hatred of his tenants and the memory of his mad-hero father. His children's nurse, Mary, has memories of lost love to torment her, as well as of the husband and child who died of hunger. And the ballad singer Mulvey has both his monstrous past and the certain promise that he will be tortured to death by the Liable Men should he not kill Meredith. This is a kaleidoscopic novel, whose events are seen in many idioms, from many points of view--it is a rich novel that knows that there are limits to the sense that can be made of history. --Roz Kaveney --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Praise for Joseph O'Connor's "Inishowen":
"This is a tremendous book; affecting, intelligent, ironic, humane and utterly convincing. It is also
extremely funny." -- "Spectator"
"His writing is terrific." -- Roddy Doyle

"From the Hardcover edition."

‘This is a tremendous book; affecting, intelligent, ironic, humane and utterly convincing. It is also extremely funny.’ --This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

'Ireland's most brilliant storyteller' Sunday Independent

In the bitter winter of 1847, from an Ireland torn by injustice and natural disaster, the Star of the Sea sets sail for New York. On board are hundreds of fleeing refugees. Among them are a maidservant with a devastating secret, bankrupt Lord Merridith and his family, an aspiring novelist, a maker of revolutionary ballads, all braving the Atlantic in search of a new home. Each is connected more deeply than they can possibly know. But a camouflaged killer is stalking the decks, hungry for the vengeance that will bring absolution. The twenty-six day journey will see many lives end, others begin afresh. In a spellbinding story of tragedy and mercy, love and healing, the further the ship sails towards the Promised Land, the more her passengers seem moored to a past which will never let them go. (20030723)

'Ireland's most brilliant storyteller' Sunday Independent

The international No. 1 bestseller

'This is Joseph O'Connor's best book. It is shocking, hilarious, beautifully written, and very, very clever' Roddy Doyle

'A terrific story...A stealthily gripping narrative' Daily Telegraph

In the bitter winter of 1847, from an Ireland torn by injustice and natural disaster, the Star of the Sea sets sail for New York.

On board are hundreds of fleeing refugees. Among them are a maidservant with a devastating secret, bankrupt Lord Merridith and his family, an aspiring novelist, a maker of revolutionary ballads, all braving the Atlantic in search of a new home. All are connected more deeply than they can possibly know. But a camouflaged killer is stalking the decks, hungry for the vengeance that will bring absolution.

The twenty-six day journey will see many lives end, others begin afresh. In a spellbinding story of tragedy and healing, the further the ship sails towards the Promised Land, the more her passengers seem moored to a past which will never let them go.

'A triumph...A spectacular breakthrough' Sunday Times

'His most substantial and impressive novel to date' Irish Times

'A masterful storyteller...A thrilling tale...O'Connor writes with nothing less than incandescent passion...Unfailingly gripping' The Times

'A modern masterpiece...The language is absolutely gorgeous' Bob Geldof

Joe O'Connor was born in Dublin. He has written ten widely acclaimed and best-selling books including the novels Cowboys and Indians, shortlisted for the Whitbread Prize, Desperadoes, The Salesman, and most recently Inishowen. His work has been published in eighteen languages. (20030723)

THE LEAVE-TAKING
THE FIRST OF OUR TWENTY-SIX DAYS AT SEA: IN WHICH OUR PROTECTOR RECORDS SOME ESSENTIAL PARTICULARS, AND THE CIRCUMSTANCES ATTENDING OUR SETTING- OUT.
VIII NOV. MDCCCXLVII
Monday the eighth day of November, Eighteen Hundred and Forty-Seven
Twenty-five days at sea remaining.
The following is the only register of Josias Tuke Lockwood, Master of Vessel, signed and written in his own hand; and I attest it on my solemn honour a compleat and true account of the voyage, and neither has any matter pertinent been omitted.
LONG: 10°16.7W. LAT: 51°35.5N. ACTUAL GREENWICH STANDARD TIME: 8.17p.m. WIND DIR. & SPEED:S.S.W. Force 4. Buffeting SEAS: rough. HEADING: W.N.W. 282.7°. PRECIPITATION. & REMARKS: Mild mist all the day but very cold and clear night. Upper riggings encrusted with ice. Dursey Island to starboard. Tearagh Isld visible at 52°4.5N, 10°39.7W, most westerly point of Ireland and therefore of the United Kingdom. (Property of the Earl of Cork.)
NAME OF VESSEL: The Star of the Sea (formerly the Golden Lady).
BUILDER: John Wood, Port Glasgow (prop. engines by M. Brunel).
OWNER: Silver Star Shipping Line & Co.
PREVIOUS VOYAGE: Dublin Port (South Docks) – Liverpool – Dublin Kingstown.
PORT OF EMBARKATION: Queenstown (or The Cove). 51°51N; 008°18W.
PORT OF DESTINATION: New York. 40°.42N; 74°.02W.
DISTANCE: 2,768 nautical miles direct: to be factorised for tacking into westerlies.
FIRST MATE: Thos. Leeson.
ROYAL MAIL AGENT: George Wellesley Esq. (accompnd. by a servant, Briggs).
WEIGHT OF VESSEL: 1,154 gross tons.
LENGTH OF VESSEL: 207ft ×beam 34ft.
GENERAL: clipper bows, one funnel, three square-rig masts (rigged for sail), oaken hull (copperfastened), three decks, a poop and topgallant forecastle, side-paddle wheel propulsion, full speed 9 knots. All seaworthy though substantial repairs required; also damage to interior fittings & cetera. Bad leaking through overhead and bulkheads of steerage. Hull to be audited in dry dock at New York and caulked if required.
CARGO: 5,000 lbs of mercury for Alabama Mining Co. The Royal Mail (forty bags). Sunderland coal for fuel. (Poor quality the supply, dirty and slaggy.) Luggage of passengers. Spare slop in stores. One grand piano for John J. Astor Esq. at New York.
PROVISIONS: sufficient of freshwater, ale, brandy, claret, rum, pork, cocks, mutton, biscuit, preserved milk & cetera. Also oat-meal, cutlings, molasses, potatoes, salt or hung beef, pork, bacon and hams, salted veal, fowl in pickle, coffee, tea, cyder, spices, pepper, ginger, flour, eggs, good port wine and porter-beer, pickled colewort, split peas for soup; and lastly, vinegar, butter, and potted herrings. Live beasts (caged) to be butchered on board: pigs, chickens, lambs and geese.
One passenger, a certain Meadowes, is lodged in the lock-up for drunkenness and fighting. (A hopeless out-and-outer: he shall have to be watched.) Suspected case of Typhus Fever moved to the hold for isolation.
Be it recorded that this day three passengers of the steerage class died, the cause in each case being the infirmity consequent on prolonged starvation. Margaret Farrell, fifty-two yrs, a married woman of Rathfylane, Enniscorthy, County Wexford; Joseph English, seventeen yrs (formerly, it is said, apprenticed to a wheelwright) of no fixed place but born near Cootehill, County Cavan; and James Michael Nolan of Skibbereen, County Cork, aged one month and two days (bastard child).

Their mortal remains were committed to the sea. May Almighty God have mercy upon their souls: ‘For here have we no continuing city, but we seek the one to come.’
We have thirty-seven crew, 402 ½ .ordinary steerage passengers (a child being reckoned in the usual way as one half of one adult passenger) and fifteen in the First-Class quarters or superior staterooms. Among the latter: Earl David Merridith of Kingscourt and his wife the Countess, their children and an Irish maidservant. Mr G.G. Dixon of the New York Tribune: a noted columnist and man of letters. Surgeon Wm. Mangan, M.D. of the Theatre of Anatomy, Peter Street, Dublin, accompanied by his sister, Mrs Derrington, relict; His Imperial Highness, the potentate Maharajah Ranjitsinji, a princely personage of India; Reverend Henry Deedes, D.D., a Methodist Minister from Lyme Regis in England (upgraded); and various others.
As we sailed this day came heavy news of the wreck of the Exmouth out of Liverpool on the 4th ult. with the loss of all 239 ½ emigrants on board and all but three of the crew. May Almighty God have mercy upon their souls: and may He bestow greater clemency upon our own voyage; or at least observe it with benign indifference.
. . poeple that Cuts a great dash at home when they come here [to America] the[y] tink it strange for the humble Class of poeple to get as much respect as themselves [but] when they come here it wont do to say i had such and was such and such at home [for] strangers here the[y] must gain respect by there conduct and not by there tongue . . . i know poeple here from [Ireland] that would not speak to me [there] if they met me on the public road [but] here i can laugh in there face when i see them . . .
Letter from Patrick Dunny, Irish immigrant to Philadelphia --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.