Novel Writing

By this time Patrick MacGill was a literary personality in London. Although he had written many noteworthy works, charged with a masterful personality, his true talent for writing had so far not been fully realised, neither in his poetry nor his reporting. In 1914 and 1915 MacGill published his two interlocking novels, Children of the Dead End (1914) and The Rat Pit (1915).

http://www.knightfeatures.com/KFWeb/content/PKBA/Bios/MacGill.html

Both novels are autobiographical to a large extent and with first hand knowledge MacGill describes the experiences of a 'navvy' in Scotland and England. "MacGill was to write more novels, some with an Irish setting and some with an English background, but never again would he achieve the intensity of these two novels that really form a single work."(5) Described as indeed one book, both tell the story of Dermod Flynn and Norah Ryan, who as children migrate to Scotland from Ireland to work in the potato fields.

Through Children of the Dead End (1914) MacGill exposed the social injustices of the oppressed using the character Moleskin Joe. A combination of tramp and philosopher, Moleskin Joe's favourite expression was, "There's a good time coming, but we'll never live to see it". From the Garden House at Windsor, in January 1914, Patrick MacGill wrote in the foreword for this book:

In the following pages I have endeavoured to tell of the navvy; the life he leads, the dangers he dares, and the death he often dies…it must be said that nearly all the incidents of the book have come under the observation of the writer: that such incidents should take place makes the tragedy of the story.(6)

The complete collection of MacGill's literary works is available at the Central Library, Letterkenny. See Donegal Library website.

The companion novel, The Rat Pit (1915), vividly describes the R.I.C (Royal Irish Constabulary) in Glenties, County Donegal.

The policemen, one to every fifty souls in the village, paraded idly up and down the street, their heavy batons clanking against their trousers, and their boots spotlessly clean, rasping eternally on the pavement. Their sole occupation seems to be in the kicking of unoffending dogs.(7)

Throughout the two novels MacGill makes use of folk-speech and there is the occasional word in Irish. The books also describe with grand vigour the making of the huge aluminium factory at Kinlochleven, which drew 'navvies' from all parts of Britain and Ireland to form a community. Indeed, it in this very community that MacGill met his legendary Moleskin Joe.