The Gazette 1994

GAZETTE

AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 1994

Ref l ect ions on t he Li fe and Wr i t i ngs of Terence de \fere White

By Daire Hogan*

Donleavy in the purchase for £350, of a rather derelict cottage and four acres at Kilcoole, Co. Wicklow, and was consulted by his friend, Gainor Stephen Crist, the original "Ginger Man", about the establishment of a private drinking club. Donleavy writes that "one imagines that Mr de Vere White cautioned upon the licensing difficulties and expense of such a venture for Crist failed to pursue the matter." In The Remainderman, a law clerk writes to an apprentice, dispirited by his initial contact with the law, that he should persist and "later on you may give up this life which I can see does not attract you much". That in due course his literary career developed to the exclusion of law in his life should not obscure the fact that he had a full legal career in itself. The novels with a particular legal interest were informed and animated by a very thorough knowledge of legal practice. An Affair with the Moon (1959) is narrated by an English solicitor who moves to Ireland, and is advised when purchasing a property to do so not in his own name but through a defunct company (Fit U Limited) supplied by his solicitor, to save an enormous sum in stamp duty. Mr Stephen is a splendid account of legal manoeuvres in property development or site assembly in north County Dublin. His first book, written as the preface indicates with unusual precision in these matters between October 1943 and November 1945, was a life of Isaac Butt. Between November 1946 and May 1948 he wrote his biography of Kevin O'Higgins. In 1957 he published the strange A Fretful Midge, nominally or supposedly the memoirs of one Bernard Vandeleur, but in fact an autobiographical account of Irish ! life in the 1940s and 1950s. j A sense of fun in small matters is very ! strong in his books; an old solicitor in ' 263

There cannot be many novels which commence in the manner of Terence de Vere White's Mr Stephen (published in 1971) with a dinner given at his home by the President of the Law Society to the members of the Council (or, indeed, conclude with another dinner hosted by the President, in the zoo). One guest, the eponymous "Mr Stephen" Foster reflects that "There was nothing creative about the life [of the average attorney]. All one left after one was the money that showed what you had earned and how you had looked after it, and a name that was forgotten in five years. A hall porter in a large hotel had more fame in life and as long in memory." de Vere White demonstrated the remarkable respect and affection in which he was held by his friends and colleagues, the breadth of his interests and his contribution to many walks of Irish life. He will be remembered for very much longer and for being very much more than the average attorney. He wrote over 25 books, including a dozen novels. A number of these deal with legal themes or personalities, and an aspect of his work in which lawyers might take a particular interest is the depiction of professional life in Dublin in the mid-century in a number of his earlier novels, published between 1957 and 1971. Much of their physical landscape has disappeared or changed - his characters dine in Jammet's, following which one of them wishes to climb up to the top of the Nelson Pillar, or at the Russell Hotel, or meet for drinks at the Hibernian - but his portrayal of states of minds of lawyers, apprentices, law clerks, secretaries and clients will endure. These books include some of his best writing and - irrespective of any legal connection - certainly appeal to a The obituaries and appreciations published on the death in June of Mr

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Daire

Hogan

wider audience than that contemplated by the curious note on the dust-jacket of The Remainderman (1963) advising the prospective reader that it will interest "people bored with vast American novels and with the cult of sexual grossness." Mr de Vere White, who was the son of a solicitor, was admitted as a solicitor in 1933 and practised for over 30 years, from 1947 in partnership in McCann White and FitzGerald. His offices were initially in Nassau Street and thereafter in St. Stephen's Green. He was elected to membership of the Council of the Law Society between 1954 and 1961. In that year, having for some time, like Trollope, written early in the morning before attending at his office, he left the law to become Literary Editor of The Irish Times. He can be found in the diaries of Evelyn Waugh, obtaining "written instructions" in 1946 to bid at an auction of a castle on behalf of Waugh, a sensible precaution since the diarist was "in a sort of stupor" after a long lunch at the Unicorn. Twenty-five years later Mr Stephen would contain a description of that lunchtime institution in Merrion Row. At about this time Mr de Vere White also acted for JP