Will Adley’s authentic accent please speak up!

Double Vision with Charlie Adley

Dalooney, the Body and myself are talking outside Rob Kenny’s lovely café, Pura Vida; just behind us the lads from the council are hammering a pneumatic drill into the bottom of Quay Street.

In less urban corners of the Emerald Isle people seek the first cry of the cuckoo as the signal of spring.

In Galway City, it’s the Lifting of the Cobbles Festival, whereupon hundreds of the thousands of cobblestones lining the streets of the medieval heart of the city are ceremoniously raised and then lowered once again.

The cacophonous cocktail of metal, stone and diesel that’s rebounding off Jury’s walls is so loud it leaves me trying to read The Body’s lips.

As it happens, over the years I’ve tried the same tactic in normal conversation. The Body has a deep and very particular voice, which can be difficult for this Englishman to hear at times.

When himself and Whispering Blue are swapping stories, I sit back and smile – at them not with them – because I don’t have a clue what they’re saying to each other.

One mumbles “Blahimm shissshhhgaboodle?” to which the other replies heatedly “Frickle jug mug kashh-heesh!”

At which point they both roar with laughter and I laugh too, because they are my friends and even if I don’t get their joke, that doesn’t stop the entire vignette being funny to me.

It’s puzzling that after over 20 years I still find it difficult to understand my closest Irish friends, because when I’ve lived out in the countryside, I’ve generally acclimatised to the local vernacular fairly well.

I’m one of those dreadful people whose accent wobbles with the wind. This is no mere fickle foible. I don’t do it on purpose. Neither is it linked to any vain desire to be liked. A fine colyoomist I’d be, if all I sought was acceptance.

However when I try to stop doing it, I consciously have to force myself to talk in my normal voice. Maybe it’s linked to my Jewish history, a desire to assimilate, to blend in? Or is it simply a subconscious desire not to be blamed yet again for the British Empire?

Whatever it is that drives my inadequacy I do know that when aided by several whiskies and abetted by a late night-time hour, my voice grows deep and gravelly while my accent becomes sufficiently authentic to make a Connemara farmer ask

“Local man, are ya? Where is it you’re from then?”

I was in no way trying to pass myself off as local, but he was genuinely shocked to find out I was a Londoner. Mind you, my friend in Castlebar has for years shrieked with horror and shrunk back whenever I unleash what she delightfully describes as

“Your feckin’ leprechaun voice.”

She reckons that himself the farmer and all others who’ve mentioned my accent in any complimentary way were taking the piss, telling me how good it was, while I was foolish enough to swallow their bait.

I’m naturally paranoid, and therefore see myself as pretty good at identifying verbal attacks, but I’m not Irish so I cannot disagree with her.

To read Charlie’s full column, please see this week’s Galway City Tribune.