Big and Learned and Far From Simple: Intellectual Narration in "The Plain People of Ireland" and The Third Policeman

Brian Ó Nualláin is a man of many names and many voices. The narrative power he possesses is exemplified when comparing the ‘Plain People of Ireland’ segments of the Cruiskeen Lawn columns in The Irish Times, penned under the pseudonym Myles na gCopaleen, and the voice of the nameless narrator in Flann O’Brien’s The Third Policeman. Within these two works, the position of the intellectual in Irish society is portrayed through quite different lenses: the self-confident, perpetually correct Myles, and the timid, obsessively rational narrator. While both voices are erudite and authoritative, their positioning within the environments they inhabit could not be more different. This article examines the positioning of the ‘intellectual narrator’ in Ireland, as portrayed by the various voices of Ó Nualláin, focusing specifically on the tone utilised throughout the respective pieces to differentiate the social standing of the narrators from those they encounter. The mastery of language apparent in both ‘The Plain People of Ireland’ and The Third Policeman subverts the expected portrayal of a public intellectual, destabilising the inherent class politics that imbue both works without dismantling them all together.