One of the most intriguing friendships in Irish history has been transformed into fiction the bond between Lord Edward Fitzgerald, aristocrat turned revolutionary, and Tony Small, a runaway slave who saved his life.
Film-maker Neil Jordan is also an award-winning novelist, and this panoramic, painstakingly researched novel told through Small’s voice is a convincing reconstruction of the way their lives interlocked despite origins in diametrically opposed worlds.
One man sprang from Ireland’s most patrician family, the other was born into slavery on an American plantation. They met in 1781 during the American War of Independence, when Small dragged Lord Edward, wounded and unconscious, from a battlefield the young lieutenant was fighting on behalf of the British crown.
9 min read
Ireland s most garlanded director talks about ageism in film, Harvey Weinstein and his new novel, about the aristocratic rebel Lord Edward FitzGerald and his manservant, the freed slave Tony Small
We begin by comparing facial hair. Neil Jordan has cough-cough years on me, but, over the previous 12 months, we seem to have mutated into variations on the same grizzled, spectacled hermit
âHow is that beard coming?â he asks.
Our most garlanded film director â who is currently holed up in his rural Cork pad â has been eyeing the closing, opening and closing again of cinemas with weary interest. Among his greatest pleasures is âwalking down a city centre street and going into the cinemaâ. That wonât be happening for a while.