Kevin Barry: The biggest difference between Limerick and Cork

Award-winning novelist and short story writer Kevin Barry is a native of Limerick but spent a formative period living and working in Cork city. He debated their respective personalities with Michael Moynihan

Kevin Barry: Is a bit worried about Sunday’s clash of Limerick and Cork. Picture: David Levenson/Getty Images

Five years ago Kevin Barry wrote the greatest single account of an Irish city you are ever likely to read, a discursive, personal remembrance of a place complete with scones, white cowboy boots, and lamping rabbits.

‘The Raingod’s Green, Dark as Passion’ for Granta magazine is well worth your time - it’s a description of Cork written by a Limerick native, award-winning novelist and short story writer Kevin Barry.

This week of all weeks, what’s the difference between the two places?

“I moved from Limerick to Cork towards the end of 1993, and even then there was one difference between the cities which was very evident, and that was self-confidence,” says Barry.

“Cork, even though it was as economically depressed at the time as anywhere else in the country, had a healthy level of self-regard, put it that way, while in Limerick at that time there wasn’t the same level of self-confidence. We couldn’t wait to get out of the place.

“That’s all very different now, Limerick is a very different place compared to back then, which is no surprise because it’s almost 30 years ago, but when I go back to Limerick I notice that difference, which seemed to start around the early noughties.

“It’s just developed a self-confidence — when I was in my early 20s in Limerick if you were interested in doing something culturally or artistically, your first notion was to get out of the place: you wouldn’t see us for dust.

“And a lot of that might be economics, too, people realising that it’d be cheaper to stay in Limerick than to go off and rent a place in Paris. Or Dublin, come to that. So people stay around more and that self-confidence is there, which is a pretty dramatic change in the sense of itself.

“And maybe that’s evident on the pitch, too, that confidence surging through fellas.

“The difference was that even then Cork people loved Cork — they loved Cork — while Limerick people might have been giving out about Limerick. They might have been doing so in a fond way, maybe, but even so. That’s flipped around, though.”

What did they have in common? A chip on the shoulder about Dublin?

“I think that would definitely be shared. To me, Cork always felt like a big country town and Limerick like a small city.

“Limerick’s setting, down on the docks, with all that Georgian architecture, always felt like an urban place while Cork to me had the feel of a warm country town.

“That’s not making us out to be city slickers up the road, because I also felt that Limerick suffered a little from being in between Cork and Galway.

“Culturally those cities seemed to have more going on back then — Cork had the jazz festival and the film festival, for instance, while Galway had become famous as a cultural centre.

“In Limerick, we were casting dirty glances up and down the road at the two of them.”

Which is not to say there wasn’t cross-pollination between Cork and Limerick.

“One thing Limerick had, ironically, was a great city manager from Cork in the late 80s in Jack Higgins.

“He did a lot of things that helped Limerick turn around and face the river again, which was really transformative for the city.

“There was a weird situation in Limerick in that a lot of the city was built away from the river, and for decades all of the development in the city was built to face away from the river.

“Maybe the thinking was that the wind coming off the river would cut through you.

“Sometimes that thinking came through, too. I remember as a junior reporter in Limerick covering council meetings in the early 90s, and when the notion was raised at some of those that cafes should be put down along the river, councillors would be asking if they’d be sitting in those cafes in their overcoats.

“That was the attitude but over the last couple of decades it’s swivelled on its axis to face the river, in fairness. Other things have given Limerick confidence as well — Munster Rugby in the late ’90s and onwards was a huge factor in giving the place a surge of confidence.”

Well, you brought the sport into it.

“The match? I’m a bit worried. Much as I love Cork there’s no getting away from the primal feelings when it comes to hurling. I know that Limerick are the favourites, but that old GAA karma, I can’t help but worry that Cork are ‘due’ an All-Ireland.

“In 1973, when Limerick won for the last time before the current team made their breakthrough, I was wheeled down to the homecoming in my pram. Four years of age, so I don’t know what I was doing still using the pram, but I’ve been told I was at the homecoming.

“But it’s been fantastic the last couple of years, the way Limerick have been playing. I’ve really enjoyed it and I’m looking forward to Sunday, definitely.”

- That Old Country Music by Kevin Barry is out now in paperback