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At last! Danny
Devenny is doing a book. He will have to finish it now that this column
has broken the story. It will be a photographic and literary journey through
his very eventful life. In my opinion Danny Dee deserves a book or
twenty books to celebrate his life in struggle and his art.He has
enriched all our lives with his creativity and brightened Belfast’s
streetscape and educated and uplifted its citizens and visitors with his
murals. He will tell how art has been a huge help to him through all his
decades of activism. That’s where this painting THE SESSION
comes in.
THE SESSION
features John Lennon, Danny’s friend Bobby Sands, Ché Guevara, Chilean activist song writer and
poet Víctor Jara and Woody Guthrie the great American song writer and
activist. It is available as a limited edition print and a not-for-profit funder
for Danny’s book. Check out his Facebook page and private message Danny if
you want to buy a copy.
Danny has had
a mind to do such a painting for a long time. He was in Long Kesh with Bobby
and knows how much music meant to him. Bobby loved John Lennon. He would
love being in a session with him. And the others. He admired them all. There is
a photo of a session of poítín drinking prisoners in Cage Eleven which
Danny based his painting on. I will tell you the story of that photo and that
session another time.
Anyway Danny
delayed doing that painting because he couldn't do a side view of Bobby’s face
which satisfied him. Then Richard McAuley found the photo of Bobby in French photographer Gerard Harlay’s portfolio of
photos when we were doing work on the Léargas book on Máire Drumm. That, and
the pandemic, allowed the space for Danny Dee to work his magic.
I know the
political value of that magic from my time in
the Kesh with him in the mid 70’s. Danny Dee did the art work for a number of
publications produced in Cage Eleven and smuggled outside. These included Peace
In Ireland and Our British Problem – unpublished- by this columnist and In Care Of Her Majesty’s Prisons by Hugh
Feeney and Prison Struggle. He also did illustrations for the
Brownie articles which were smuggled out to the Sinn Féin paper
Republican News. His pen name was Flossie.
Danny and
Bobby were in the Gaeltacht hut in Cage Eleven. Bobby used to drive his
comrades mad as he practised his guitar skills and learned his songs. Tomboy
Loudon was just as bad. He was learning the mandolin. Bobby was taught guitar
by blues legend Rab McCullough. They started in the Crum (Crumlin Road Prison) where there were two guitars. Bobby
heard Rab playing and asked him for a few tips. Rab was already an accomplished
guitarist. He had been in a number of bands,including Sunshine and The Big Soul
Band.
When Tomboy
and Bobby were moved to Long Kesh Rab –an exponent of Robert Johnson’s Delta
Blues style–showed Bobby more tricks of the trade. He recalls Bobby was a big
Rod Stewart and The Facesfan. He and Tomboy favoured Mandolin Wind.
They also
picked up on Christy Moore. Ewen McColl’s fine
ballad ‘Tim Evans’ was one of
Bobbys first songs. Christy’s renditions led him to Woody Guthrie. James
Taylor, Neil Young, Dylan, Bowie, Loudan Wainright 111, Leonard Cohen all
influenced him. He used the melody of Gordon Lightfoots ‘The Wreck of The
Edmund Fitzgerald’ years later in
the H Blocks for ‘Back Home in Derry.’
He loved The
Beatles. Especially John Lennon and Paul McCartney because of their songs on
Ireland. When Lennon was threatened with deportation from New York, Bobby
was among the prisoners who signed a petition in Cage 8 to support him.
When McCartney formed Wings Bobby rehearsed ‘Mamunia’ until his hutmates dispaired. They
threw oranges and apples at him another time, according to Paddy Donnelly, as
he struggled before eventually getting the key change in Lennon’s
Imagine. I recall him learning Kris Kristofferson’s ‘Bobby Magee’ in the study hut, just the two of us
there, as I whiled away my time planning my next unsuccesful escape.
For their first
Christmas in Long Kesh, in Cage 17, Tomboy, Rab and Bobby played at the Cage
Concert. By the time they arrived in Cage 11 both Bobby and Tomboy had a
reasonable collection of songs. When Coireall MacCurtain arrived in from
Limerick and started Irish ranganna his teaching regime included A Singing
Rang. Bobby, by now a committed Gaeilgeoir, learned ‘Gleanntáin Ghlas' Ghaoth Dobhair’ and ‘Báidín Fheilimí’. He later went on to write his own songs í
nGaeilge. There was only one Record Player in the Cage. Each hut got a go
at it. Bobby played Prosperous non-stop and Clannad, Band On The Run and Bowie. By
now his brother Seán had sent him in a guitar and song books.
I remember him playing
and singing at our Cage concert the Christmas before he was released. Tomboy
got out later and Bobby played at his homecoming gig in Unity Flats. He then
suggested to Tomboy that they form a group. They did. Pheonix was their name.
They had only two gigs. In the LESA (League
of Ex-Servicemen’s Association) and Saint Matthew’s clubs. Then Bobby
was re-arrested and Tomboy was back on the run.
Before then they had one good night down in Omeath. Tomboy recalls they ended up at a local wedding. A showband, The Four Aces was playing and most of the older wedding guests were walzing serenely as Bobby, his wife Geraldine and Tomboy watched. When Bobby went off to the Gents Tomboy put his name down for a song request. He was duly called and on borrowing a guitar from one of The Four Aces Bobby launched into ‘Pinball Wizard’ by The Who. Tomboy says none of the walzers applauded at the end. Suitably mortified Bobby told Tomboy with a big grin that it was like he was back singing in the Kesh.
All of this
was before the horrrors of the H Blocks. So is the photo which Danny Dee
used for The Session. He told me he wanted to show Bobby as he was. ’A
light hearted funny guy’.
Thank you
Danny Dee. May your murals keep our heads high. Go raibh maith agat Bobby
Sands. Let your music keep our spirits high.
Solidarity with the Palestinian People
A few weeks
ago this column wrote about the hunger strike of Palestinian prisoner Maher
al-Akhras. He was on hunger strike for a remarkable 104 days against his
internment by Israeli authorities under their infamous ‘administrative
detention’ system. Maher ended his hunger strike on the 6 Novemer
following a commitment that he would be released on 26 November and not served
with a further detention order.
Two weeks ago he won his freedom and was taken to the Najah hospital in Nablus in the
occupied west Bank. Maher’s courageous stand against the shameful system of
administrative detention successfully brought the use of this repressive
legislation to a wider international audience. It is also a reminder of the
denial of sovereignty to the Palestinian people; the ongoing occupation of Palestinian
land by Israel; and the apartheid system which most Palestinian’s are forced to
live under.
Two Sunday's ago was the ‘International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People’.
This annual act of solidarity with the Palestinian people was agreed by the
United Nations General Assembly in 1977 (resolution 32/40 B). It takes place on 29 November
each year in remembrance of the resolution passed on that day by the UN which
partitioned Palestine (resolution 181 (II)).
The partition of Palestine has created over
80 years of conflict and instability in that region. The human rights
consequences for the Palestinian people have been horrendous. The Palestinian
people are regularly denied freedom of movement; access to jobs, goods and
services, including fuel and food and in the midst of a pandemic, healthcare.
Three weeks ago
in an act symbolic of the conditions endured by the people of Palestine, 73
people, including 41 children, were forcibly removed from their homes in the
village of Khirbet Humsa and watched as Israeli military excavators smashed
them into the ground. The Israeli forces also destroyed 30 tones of food for
animals and confiscated two tractors.
It was according
to the United Nations the largest forced displacement incident in four years.
Yvonne Helle the United Nations coordinator for the occupied Palestinian
territory said: “Demolitions are a key means of creating an environment
designed to coerce Palestinians to leave their homes.” So far this
year almost 700 structures have been demolished in East Jerusalem and the west
Bank.
However this Israeli tactic goes beyond
demolishing Palestinian homes. For years it has destroyed EU funded infrastructure projects in
Palestine. Last year 127 structures, mostly funded by EU member states, were
destroyed in Israeli authorities. In September 2019 EU member states spoke out
against the Israeli policy of demolition. At the time they reported that “the
period from March to August 2020 saw the highest average destruction rate in
four years."
At the same time the EU, which
purports to support a two state solution, is Israel’s number one trade partner.
It also sells significant amounts of weapons to Israel.
The effect of this contradictory,
confusing and ineffective stance by the international community allows the
Israeli government to ignore protests and the demands of the United Nations for
Israel to accept the rights of the people of Palestine.
The diplomatic and political policy of successive Irish
governments in respect of the Palestinian people has failed. It’s time for a
new strategy. In 2014 the Oireachtas voted in support of the Irish government
officially recognising the state of Palestine and providing official Embassy
status to the Palestinian Mission in Dublin. It’s long overdue that this was
done. The FF/FG/GP government should also end their opposition to the
Occupied Territories Bill – which would ban imports from illegal Israeli
settlements in Palestinian territories. They should bring it back before the
Oireachtas as soon as possible.
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