Cal and the IRA

1. Cal and the IRA Cal met Crilly when he was at school. It was Crilly who led Cal into the world of the IRA. P. 13 Crilly uses Cal and has yet to let him into the IRA. P. 18 Cal is nervous of Crilly. He is aware that he can easily be persuaded into being violent. P. 13 Crilly took on Cal to assist in the job to murder Robert Morton. Cal’s part was to drive the van. The decision to murder Morton was decided because:- I. Skeffington wants to squeese the Police Reserve and the UDA. 2. Robert Morton is accused of planting a gun on two innocent Catholics. 3. Morton is supposed to have given the two Catholics a beating. P. 84/87

2. Cal and the IRA The murder is not skilfully carried out and Crilly’s gun jams during it. Cal remembers it, partly because of the brutal way that Crilly kills Robert and partly because he screams for Marcella during the killing. P. 87 Cal has an instant reaction to the murder. 1. Immediately the car stops he has to pee. P. 88 2. He feels physically sick P. 88 3. He flinches when he sees a woman beginning to drink a tomato juice P. 89 Later:- 1. He gives up his job at the abattoir 2. He will no longer eat Black Pudding Cal has no great confidence in himself. Although he regrets his involvement in the murder of Robert Morton, he allows himself to be bullied into working again for Crilly when Crilly decides to rob a shop. P. 53

3. Cal and the IRA Cal is frightened to say no. He is aware that the IRA shoot deserters. P. 93. Cal also does not believe in the things that they do. Cal believes that Crilly and Skeffington are dying for something that is not real. P. 83 Crilly and Skeffington are not prepared to let Cal leave. As they point out to him “the price for getting out is staying in”. P. 151. Because Cal wants out the others begin to see him as a “traitor to the cause.” P. 150. However Cal is very unhappy with the kind of world Crilly and Skeffington frequent. He sees their world as one which is regulated by violence. P. 148/9

4. Marcella D’Agnostini Morton Marcella was born to an Italian family and brought up in Portstewart. The family had a cafe’ business on the sea-front. Later the family sent her to Portstewart Convent for her education. P. 100 Robert Morton appeared to have a very slick tongue. It appears he could persuade anyone to do anything. It is likely that Marcella was swept off her feet by Robert and agreed to marry him. P. 143 Marriage to Robert was not very good. Although he was witty and intelligent he could not be believed. P. 143 Robert was a liar. He told Marcella lies about the money he spent, the amount and times he drank and the affairs he had. He lied about the affairs so much that Marcella considered that he believed his own lies P. 143 Robert always was supported in everything he said by his mother. P. 143

5. Marcella D’Agnostini Morton Robert appears to have been a very strict husband. The one positive thing Marcella says about her husband is that he taught her discipline. P. 132 Marriage appears to have been difficult for Marcella. First her parents were against her marrying a Protestant [ P. 115 ]. Robert appears to have expected that whatever he said was to be obeyed, and Roberts mother always supported whatever Robert said. P. 143 It appears that Marcella did not love Robert, at least by the end. After he died she never visited his grave. [ P. 132 ]. Also she did not wear black after the funeral to mourn his death. Her only concession to that was the black bikini she wore on holiday in Rome. P. 100 After Robert’s death Marcella found it suffocating staying with Robert’s parents. Both the granny and the mother suffered from illness. The only way she could get out of the house was to get a job in the library. P. 109

6. Cal and Marcella Cal is initially attracted to Marcella because of her beauty. [ P. 6 ] However when he discovers her name is Marcella he immediately wonders if it is the same Marcella whom Robert Morton shouted for. [ P. 7 ] When he realises that she is the same woman his attraction to her is increased by a desire to make up to her some of what he had done. [ P. 10 ] Cal’s attraction to Marcella is basically governed by two overpowering emotions:- 1. He is conscious that he is falling in love with a woman who is forbidden to him because of what he has done. [ 92 ] 2. His love for her is heightened by the guilt of what he has done, the memory of which he cannot get out of his mind. [ P. 91 ] After Robert’s death Marcella felt very lonely. She had never got on well with her mother-in-law, but after Robert was killed she felt very isolated at the farm, The friends that she had were actually Robert’s friends and they stopped coming to see her after a couple of months. She realised she had little in common with them anyway. One of the reason’s she went out to work was to meet new people. Marcella’s initial attraction to Cal appears to have been governed by her loneliness. [ P. 133 ]

7. Cal and Marcella • After his house is burnt down, Cal is forced to live in the cottage on the farm. [ P. 90 ] • Cal is pleased with the idea of living in the cottage. It now allows him the opportunity to be close to Marcella. “He would keep a kind of vigil and see the lights com on in different rooms and wonder whether it was Marcella or not.” P. 91 • Together he and Marcella do-up and improve the cottage. At one point when they are clearing round the pump he calls her by her name. Cal feels pleased with himself and feels this brings them together. “He realised that he had said her name for the first time and it was like meat in his mouth.” P. 104 • Just working together clearing up the outside of the cottage gave hime a wonderful feeling. In a sense it was like a date. “They had been together for nearly three hours, they had talked, he had made her laugh. In a way they had made a date. ” P. 105

8. Cal and Marcella • Marcella is grateful that Cal has come into her life. “You are good for me, Cal. You make me fell younger. Really, I should get out a bit more.” P. 116 • Cal is aware that he is obsessed with Marcella and can’t get enough of her. “He was obsessed with her - couldn’t get close enough to her” P. 125 • “He shut his eyes and remembered her lifting arm and tilted breast in the bathroom, the touch on her haunch in church, the way she held his hand by mistake and how she looked long and hard into his eyes afterwards.” P. 125 • Thinking about the distance between himself and Marcella, Cal at one point relaxes into his ugliness: “To hell, why not? If he could not take her like Sleeping Beauty then he could ravish the things which surround her.” P. 125 Frustrated at not gaining her love, in the way he wants, Cal goes into Marcella’s bedroom while she is out and like a voyeur goes through all her personal belongings. P. 126.

9. Cal and Marcella • During the meal, Cal and Marcella kiss. It is Marcella who withdraws from the kiss. She points out to Cal: “I’m a widow. With problems. You’re a boy without? ….. I still feel guilty about Robert.” P. 134 • However Cal memorises every aspect of that kiss. “ In his mind he went through the kiss again. The moist sweetness of her breath, the infinitesimal tremor in her lips, the way she opened her teeth to him, the involuntary noise she made in her throat.” P. 134 • Cal feels rejected by Marcella and is quite nasty to her. P. 135. • There is a major difference between how each feels for the other. Cal is besotted by Marcella. He is cruel to her when he feels that she does not feel towards him the way he feels towards her. Although he knows she is about to have a bath, he does not climb onto the roof to watch her. Instead he goes to the local pub to get drunk. Marcella says to him, as he leaves, “Cal, you’re my friend. Don’t be so miserable. It is the sensible thing.” P. 135

10. Cal and Marcella • Cal deliberately does not go to see Marcella for three days. On the third day [ Wednesday ] it is Marcella who comes to see him. • That night they make love for the first time. [ P. 139 - 141 ] One interesting point about this moment is that Cal confesses that he loves her. [ P. 139 ] She appears to see him as a much younger person than her self. “ Is Cal coming out to play?” P. 137 When Cal confesses that he loves her she smiles at him and asks “ Would you die for me?” P. 139. However neither then or later does she inform Cal that she loves him. For Marcella it appears that she likes him and she enjoys someone who likes her making love to her. It is not clear it goes any deeper than that. • Later she comments on love and how she sees it. “ Love is a very strange idea. I never know what it is. When your were young it seemed to be all intensity and no opportunity. Later when you did get the opportunity the fire had gone out of it.” P. 142. That appears to be the difference between Cal and Marcella. Although a new opportunity has appeared for Marcella, it will take time for her to adjust to it. Cal on the other hand, is all intensity. The problem with Cal is that it appears his guilt is what is driving this intensity.

11. Cal arrested • Skeffington’s retribution against the person who knocked down his father and broke both his legs and his skull [ P. 149 ] begins the final sequence. To punish him, Skeffington order the person is knee-capped with the humane killer. Cal points out to Crilly and Skeffington that such an act will lead back to them. On P. 152, the police arrive to raid Skeffington’s house. Cal is convinced they will blame him for this. • Fleeing from the police, Cal ends up back with Marcella. That night, when Marcella is asleep, Cal reflects on his situation with her. It is Grunewald’s picture of Christ that appears to make the decision for him. It is the weight of the suffering on the image that makes him realise he needs to disclose to Marcella his part in the death of Robert. “ Cal looked at the flesh of Christ spotted and torn, bubonic almost, and then behind it at the smoothness of Marcella’s body and it became a permament picture in his mind.” [P. 155 ] • He realises the best way to tell her, which will not involve him becoming confused, is to tell Marcella in a letter. P. 156

12. Cal arrested • Just before he gets out of bed to write the letter, he touches Marcella. “ She grumbled in her sleep and jack-knifed, closing him out.” P. 156. As he leaves the bed, it appears that already Marcella is moving away from him. The next morning when she reads the letter, she informs the police and he is arrested. • Cal appears to welcome the police. Throughout novel he has been burdened by the guilt of what he did. He appears to know that they are bound to arrive; either from the letter, or being sent by Crilly and Skeffington when they are caught. Either way,he knows that “someone was going to beat him to within a inch of his life.” [ P. 156 ]

13. The Question Choose a novel or short story which deals with a powerful emotion: for example love, shame, guilt etc. Show how the emotion you have chosen affects one, or more than one, of the characters, and go on to show how it affects the course of the story. The emotions:- i. Guilt ii. Love • The best emotion to demonstrate a change in the character is GUILT. i. It is this emotion that drives his desire and love for Marcella. ii. It is the prime reason which prompts him to get out of the IRA and to have nothing further to do with working in the Abattoir. iii. It is his guilt about what he did that allows he to betray Crilly and Skeffington about the bomb in the library. P. 153

14. The Question • The course of the story is changed because Marcella eventually finds out who killed her husband and she is forced to do something about it. The love affair that might have happened, is brought to an end by Cal’s confession. • Marcella is forced to remain with Robert’s parents. • Cal & Marcella will never be together again. • Cal goes to prison and might well meet Crilly and Skeffington there. • Cal’s father will likely die before he gets out and, therefore will never see him again.

15. The Question S.1. The novel I have chosen is “Cal” by Bernard MacLaverty. S.2. A brief outline of the story of the novel. S. 3. The description of the emotion that has affected one of the characters. S.4. A description how that emotion has changed the course of the story S.5. Your conclusion.