The Tailor and Ansty?

Question

I've read this book time and time again and I don't understand how this could have been described as "pornographic" at the time it was published in 1942. I'm not Irish and I admit I don't understand the political and social forces at work in Ireland at that time, but can anyone shed some light on why this book created such an uproar then? And the word "pornography" today brings to mind explicitly sexual material, not a story of an elderly Irish couple . . . ?

What am I missing here? Please help me understand . . . tnx!

Answer 1

I am Irish and am just about to read this book so I can't comment specifically on it.

However, when I was younger an Edna O Brien novel which referred to abortion was banned.  The writer John McGahern was fired from his job because of his writing.  

In the fifties and sixties and well into the seventies the Catholic church had serious control in Ireland and lots of things were considered immoral.  For example Girl Guides in the Catholic guide organisation were not allowed by the church to camp under canvas until the 1980s!  Birth control was forbidden.

Life here is very different now.  You can buy soft p**n mags in any newsagent.  It may be hard for you to understand but you have to look at it within the time frame.

Hope this helps

Answer 2

Because fianna fail and Eamon deValera were in power and could not seperate the catholic church and state. They were both responsible for the bad things done by the church in the past.

Dev allowed the church to attain a strangle hold over irish life even the censorship board.

Archbishop mcquaid of dublin in the  was devs right hand man.

Answer 3

I haven't read it, but I just researched it a bit and it seems it was banned because of its "obscene" language.  Under the Censorship of Publications Act in 1929, print material could be banned in Ireland if it was seen to be indecent, meaning "suggestive of, or inciting to sexual immorality or unnatural vice or likely in any other similar way to corrupt or deprave."  A publication could also be banned if it made reference to contraception, abortion or inducing miscarriage, or if it referred to crime too frequently.  If the book made reference to s*x at all, it was probably enough to get it banned, though I don't know this for sure.