Ireland from the 1970s to the 1990s must have been groaning with future celebrities of the diaspora
Oh no. 'Ed Sheeran sparks backlash from fans after revealing he 'identifies culturally as Irish'.' However will he recover?
That
Mail Online headline
leads, of course, to a mere trickle of X posts raising largely facetious objections to the ginger guitar-basher's recent affiliation with the land of his fathers.
Obviously, some folk (ahem) who don't enjoy
Sheeran
's brand of inexplicably popular busker folk have done a bit of performative grumbling. Not everyone (ahem, ahem) loves the ubiquity of his chosen verb. People are forever 'identifying' as something these days. In times past you just were what you were. Those are the sort of whinges people who aren't me were making.
On balance, however, Irish people seem relaxed about Sheeran's
comments
on
The Louis Theroux Podcast
. He certainly looks Irish. He inherited an Irish name from his Belfast-born father. The nation seems prepared to draw a veil over
Galway Girl
and allow him into the larger camp. 'I identify culturally as Irish, but I was obviously born and raised in Britain,' he told
Theroux
.
READ MORE
It helps that he seems a nice enough fellow. It helps further that he is among that sizeable portion of the diaspora, a few other celebrities also among them, that I am going to identify as the Holidayed with Granny cadre.
We have long been a tad wary of the third-generation immigrant to the United States who thinks his Irishness is equivalent to those who grew up with Bosco and warm Cidona. You know who we're talking about. Patty's Day, Irish car bomb cocktails, corned beef and cabbage, dying the river green. All that baloney. We'll put up with it while he's paying for the drinks, but we're sniggering behind hands as we're doing so.
The descendants of immigrants to Britain tend to have a more dynamic relationship with the home country. They watch much the same telly. They listen to the same music. Even before the advent of budget flights, they were only a relatively cheap train and ferry journey away from the old country.
So they Holidayed with Granny. On the evidence of interviews in this newspaper and others, Ireland was, during summers from the 1970s through the 1990s, groaning with future celebrities of the diaspora. 'We'd spend all of our holidays in Ireland,' Sheeran said. 'My first musical experiences were in Ireland. I grew up with trad music in the house.'
Liam
and
Noel Gallagher
spent the summers in Charlestown, Co Mayo. Martin McDonagh's holidays in Galway influenced his subsequent plays and films.
Shane MacGowan
knocked about Tipperary in the warmer months. Back in 2013 I talked to
Steve Coogan
, raised in Manchester, about his own travels back to the sod. 'Some people went to Spain every summer, I went to Mayo,'
he said
. 'When I left people would ask me when I was coming 'back home' again.'
Coogan, who also has family in Cork, discussed a relaxed blending of cultures. There is no sense of any chips on the shoulder. No attempt to be something you're not. 'There was never an anti-Englishness,' he told me. 'We supported the England football team. My mum would support Ireland as well.'
[
From the archive: 'I'd abolish the royal family' - Steve Coogan on what separates him from Alan Partridge
Opens in new window
]
In a perfect world (or nation) no purity tests would be invoked when someone 'identified' as Irish. We do not live in that world (or nation). Racists bristle when people of colour – even those born and raised here – declare themselves of the flock. The kaleidoscope of traits that can get you labelled a 'west Brit' has scarcely diminished through the years. And look how unfairly columns such as this slag off perfectly decent Irish Americans as they try to connect with the home soil. We should be ashamed of ourselves.
The offspring of immigrants to Britain – the Holidayed with Granny cadre – have, however, always found it relatively easy to slip back into their parents' and grandparents' culture. For the most part they understand the barriers as well as the stubborn connections. Coogan feels this is particularly so of those who grew up in the north of England. 'In London they maybe felt the need to assimilate more,' he told me. 'They lost the 'O' from their names more often than in Manchester. The London Irish felt more need to refine themselves.'
Anyway, we should be enormously flattered that so many people yearn to be 'culturally' Irish. One gets no sense that similar numbers are queuing up to be seen as culturally Dutch, Canadian or Maltese. Yet not everyone has the determination to pull it off. Born and raised in Cabra (or maybe Phibsborough), the late
Michael Gambon
, actor and raconteur, approached the issue in mischievous fashion when, in 2010, he was
asked
whether he was English or Irish.
'I suppose I can't get away from it, I'm English, aren't I?' he said. 'All my things are here.'
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His ability to combine both the avant-garde and the commercial remains consistently his forte. 'I am always trying to find subtlety in newness. I am always curious about other people's creativity. I have two incredible teams and if you have the right people around you, they prevent you from blowing up. Some have been with me for 11 years, some for 15 years. I can be tough, but I always hire people that I admire and have potential. I want people to challenge me and feel able to express themselves. I don't like yes people,' he said in a recent interview with Bella Freud, Former womenswear director at Brown Thomas, Shelly Corkery, reckons he will widen the appeal of Dior while keeping its DNA. 'He has a good commercial eye, is a visionary and, like Prada, pushes boundaries. There is always novelty in his collections. With his Loewe logo denim, little vests and T-shirts that young people could afford, he widened its demographic. He will modernise Dior. He will have more fun with the brand and widen the ready to wear so that a younger customer can buy into it.' A gifted communicator, with the voice of a trained actor (which he is) Anderson is a storyteller, loquacious, always adept at articulating his ideas. He spoke frankly and thoughtfully to Bella Freud in a recent interview about his background and his approach to fashion, and he described how his mother narrowly escaped the Omagh bombing in 1998. Daniel Craig and Rachel Weisz attend the Loewe 2025 show as part of Paris Fashion Week. Photograph:'Growing up, the North of Ireland was a complex place to live and it's important for me that I did grow up there and it helps me understand what I am today. The great thing about Ireland is storytelling and young people are curious, want to know you and that you believe in what you are selling, so you have to prove that you are not selling a sterile dream – otherwise it gets very corporate,' he said. Christian Dior himself was famously superstitious, believing in signs and symbols. Predicting the future is what great fashion designers do. Willie Anderson in his autobiography, Crossing the Line, tells a story of how a younger Jonathan, given the intense pressure around one of his early shows, decided holy water might give it a boost. 'There wasn't a lot of that around the house, but [Catholic] friends rode to the rescue delivering enough to float a small pleasure cruiser. Heather was on hand when the models were getting dressed. 'Jonny, will I sprinkle a bit on each model or how do you want to do this?' she asked. 'It's already sorted Mum,' he replied, 'It's in the steam irons so we can spread it!''
