Borstal Boy
Pages: 386
|Published: 1 Jan 1958
Description
This miracle of autobiography and prison literature begins: "Friday, in the evening, the landlady shouted up the stairs: 'Oh God, oh Jesus, oh Sacred Heart, Boy, there's two gentlemen here to see you. ' I knew by the screeches of her that the gentlemen were not calling to inquire after my health. . . I grabbed my suitcase, containing Pot. Chlor. , Sulph Ac, gelignite, detonators, electrical and ignition, and the rest of my Sinn Fein conjurer's outfit, and carried it to the window. . . " The men were, of course, the police, and seventeen-year-old Behan. He spent three years as a prisoner in England, primarily in Borstal (reform school), and was then expelled to his homeland, a changed but hardly defeated rebel. Once banned in the Irish Republic, Borstal Boy is both a riveting self-portrait and a clear look into the problems, passions, and heartbreak of Ireland.
