FIVE years after his death, bestselling author John McGahern continues to lambast the Catholic Church's repressive attitudes to sexuality.
A
new book has revealed the full extent of the writer's view on the
repressive attitude of the church to sex, and how it created major
problems in Ireland.
McGahern was dismissed as a Dublin
primary school teacher in the 1960s when the church directly intervened
because of the content of his second book and because he had married a
Finnish woman in a registry office.
"I see sexuality as part of life," he told the author of the new book, Eamon Maher.
"Either
all life is sacred or none of it is sacred. I'm inclined to think that
all of life is sacred and that sexuality is a very important part of
that sacredness."
The book is called 'John McGahern and the Catholic Question', and includes a lengthy interview with the bestselling author in 2001.
"McGahern
believed that the church and State worked hand in glove to ensure the
preservation of a conservative, traditional mode of existence," Dr
Maher, a director of the National Centre for Franco-Irish Studies, says
in the book.
Raw deal
"He thought that
women got a particularly raw deal in this society: they were forced to
give up work when they married and then they were deprived of
contraception, which would have allowed them control the number of
children they conceived."
There were even more sinister practices like symphysiotomy, Dr Maher says, which McGahern referred to in 'Memoir'.
"The
breaking of pelvic bones took place during difficult births in
hospitals because it was thought to be more in conformity with Catholic
teaching than Caesarean section, presumably because it was considered
more natural," he wrote.
The banning of McGahern's second novel,
'The Dark', in 1965, combined with the registry office marriage, led to
his dismissal as a primary school teacher in Clontarf.
"McGahern's handling of child sexual abuse in 'The Dark' was forthright and brave, way ahead of its time," he writes.
Dr
Maher said that his book deals with "the prophetic nature of McGahern's
writing, his ability to capture the hidden Ireland that remained buried
until very recently".