thinking about?eh? MANUS She was a goddess, Jimmy. JIMMY Better still. Sure isn't our own Grania a class of a goddess and ? MANUS Who? JIMMY' Grania?Grania?Diarmuid's Grania.2 MANUS Ah. JIMMY An d sure she can't get her fill of men. MANUS Jimmy, you're impossible. JIMMY I was just thinking to myself last night: if you had the choosing
between Athene and Artemis and Helen of Troy?all three of them Zeus's girls3?imagine three powerful- looking daughters like that all in the one parish of Athens!?now, if you had the picking between them, which would you take?
MANUS [To SARAH.] Whic h should I take, Sarah?
JIMMY N O harm to Helen; and no harm to Artemis; and indeed no harm to our own Grania, Manus. But I think I've no choice but to go bull-straight for Athene. By God, sir, them flashing eyes would fair keep a man jigged4 up constant!
8. A pale strawlike color. Jimmy is continuingwith their attempt to escape capture by Fionn. the same scene of the Odyssey. 3. I.e., daughters of the most powerful Greekgod. 9. Female red deer. As goddess of wild animals, vegetation, and the 1. Peat; dried and used for fuel. hunt, Artemis was contrasted with Athena, god2. Young and beautiful Irish princess betrothed to dess of the city. Helen's abduction was the legenthe aged but powerful Fionn mac Cumhaill; many dary cause of the Trojan War. medieval stories recount the flight of Grania and 4. jerked, caught. her lover, Dairmud, over the Irish countryside in
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248 0 / NATION AND LANGUAGE
[Suddenly and momentarily, as if in spasm, JIMMY stands to attention and salutes, his face raised in pained ecstasy. MANUS laughs. So does SARAH. JIMMY goes hack to his seat, and his reading.]
MANUS You're a dangerous bloody man, Jimm y Jack.
JIMMY 'Flashing-eyed'! Hah! Sure Homer knows it all, boy. Homer knows it
all.
[MANUS goes to the window and looks out.]
MANUS Where the hell has he got to? [SARAH goes to MANUS and touches his elhow. She mimes rocking a baby. ]
MANUS Yes, I know he's at the christening; but it doesn't take them all day
to put a name on a baby, does it?
[SARAH mimes pouring drinks and tossing them back quickly.] MANUS YOU may be sure. Which pub? [SARAH indicates. ] MANUS Gracie's?
[No. Further away.]
MANUS Con Connie Tim's?
[No. To the right of there.]
MANUS Ann a na mBreag's?
[Yes. That's it.]
MANUS Great. She'll fill him up. I suppose I may take the class then. [MANUS begins to distribute some books, slates and chalk, texts etc. beside the seats.
SARAH goes over to the straw and produces a bunch of flowers she has hidden there. During this.]
JIMMY 'Autar o ek limenos prosebe?' 'But Ulysses went forth from the harbour and through the woodland to the place where Athene had shown him he could find the good swineherd who? o oi biotoio malista kedeto'?what's that, Manus?
MANUS 'Who cared most for his substance'.
JIMMY That's it! 'The good swineherd who cared most for his substance above
all the slaves that Ulysses possessed . . .'5
[SARAH presents the flowers to MANUS.]
MANUS Those are lovely, Sarah. [But SARAH has fled in embarrassment to her seat and has her head buried in a book, MANUS goes to her.]
MANUS Flow?ers. [Pause, SARAH does not look up.] MANUS Say the word: flow?ers. Com e on?flow?ers.
SARAH Flowers.
MANUS YOU see??you're off! [MANUS leans down and kisses the top of SARAH'S head.]
MANUS An d they're beautiful flowers. Than k you. [MAIRE enters, a strong-minded, strong-bodied woman in her twenties with a head of curly hair. She is carrying a small can of milk.]
5. At the beginning of book 14 of the Odyssey, Odysseus seeks, at Athena's instruction, the field hand who has been most attentive to the hero's estate in his absence.
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FRIEL: TRANSLATIONS, ACT 1 / 2481
MAIRE Is this all's here? Is there no school this evening?
MANUS If my father's not back, I'll take it.
[MANUS stands awkwardly, having heen caught kissing SARAH and with
