Been reading a fascinating if disturbing book "The Burning of Bridget Cleary" (Angela Bourke 1999). It explores a bizzarre and notorious case occurring in Tipperary in 1895 in which a woman was burned to death by her huband, accompanied by a group of her own relatives. They apparently believed that the Bridget, who had been in bed for some days sick with bronchitis, had been stolen by the fairies and what remained in the bed was a Changeling or substitute. By burning the Changeling, the hope was that the imposter would be driven out and the real Bridget would return.
While it is impossible to get to the bottom of what really went on that night - were the bystanders really as helpless as they claimed to prevent Patrick's burning of his wife - why was a fairly common folk belief acted upon to such scarcely precedented extremes? - the book explores the event from a number of interesting angles.
The incident and responses to the incident illustrated the gulf between two worlds existing side by side - Victorian Modernity with its Police Force, telegraph, compulsory schooling, doctors and "rationality" and the thought world of the Irish rural peasantry with its complex lore about fairies, fairy doctors and other supernatural elements. Bourke explores whether talk about such things always equated with a literal belief in them or whether talking about fairies was a coded way of dealing with problems of daily life. The rejection of disabled children for example was explained or excused by raising the possibility that the child was not the parents' real offspring but a Changeling. Saying that a woman was away with the fairies could be hinting in fact at her infidelity. Bridget Cleary was known to be "haughty"; a smartly dressed, attractive milliner with her own Singer Sewing Machine and a flourishing poultry business. Was the assault upon her in part initially intended merely to humble her?
Much of the British and Irish press, in particular those of Unionist sympathies leapt on this story as evidence of how unfit the Irish clearly were for Home Rule, comparing them with those in further flung regions of the British Empire. Victorian racist discourse was ready to see the Irish as possessed of an inherent inferiority that would preclude self government. By coincidence the Oscar Wilde trial was simultaneously taking place in London and was also used against the Irish - if an anglicised and educated Irishman such as Oscar Wilde was incapable of conforming to Victorian norms what hope was there for his less privileged countrymen?
Of course this was also a period in which Irish folklore was becoming a source of interest to scholars particularly of a nationalist bent. W B Yeats and Lady Gregory were questioning countryfolk and recording their stories about fairies and the like. Lady Gregory emphasised that ill treatment of suspected Changelings was actually disapproved of in traditional fairy-lore - any abuse meted out to the fairy impostor was liable to be visited in vengeance upon the abductee. In that way such lore could in fact act as a safety valve urging tolerance of and explaining the behaviour of family members who might be suffering from periods of mental ill health such as post-natal depression - the person was "not themself" but with patience and kindness they might be hoped to return to themselves. As we know standard Victorian treatment of the mentally ill could be a lot less "civilised".
Much of the British and Irish press, in particular those of Unionist sympathies leapt on this story as evidence of how unfit the Irish clearly were for Home Rule, comparing them with those in further flung regions of the British Empire. Victorian racist discourse was ready to see the Irish as possessed of an inherent inferiority that would preclude self government. By coincidence the Oscar Wilde trial was simultaneously taking place in London and was also used against the Irish - if an anglicised and educated Irishman such as Oscar Wilde was incapable of conforming to Victorian norms what hope was there for his less privileged countrymen?
Of course this was also a period in which Irish folklore was becoming a source of interest to scholars particularly of a nationalist bent. W B Yeats and Lady Gregory were questioning countryfolk and recording their stories about fairies and the like. Lady Gregory emphasised that ill treatment of suspected Changelings was actually disapproved of in traditional fairy-lore - any abuse meted out to the fairy impostor was liable to be visited in vengeance upon the abductee. In that way such lore could in fact act as a safety valve urging tolerance of and explaining the behaviour of family members who might be suffering from periods of mental ill health such as post-natal depression - the person was "not themself" but with patience and kindness they might be hoped to return to themselves. As we know standard Victorian treatment of the mentally ill could be a lot less "civilised".
