It is such a darn stereotype that I can hear the groaning of millions of paddies from Dublin to Dubai, from Belfast to Baltimore; “Forget about the bloody black stuff, move on will ya“. And yet here’s the thing…

My relationship with Guinness is artistic, political, international, culinary and romantic. Like many I grew up with an image of Guinness that involved beardy men in chunky jumpers bashing out trad tunes in smoky pubs and yet at the same time I can clearly recall my mother lying in hospital and on her nightstand stood a bottle of Guinness. This was about the time Guinness was running the advert “Guinness is good for you” – which was roughly true as it was regularly administered in hospitals to help people put on weight due to the fact it was full of iron.

Actually on a side note – I once knew a guy – a Marxist – who argued that you could tell a place that had good class consciousness by the quality of the beer on sale. If it was weak and watery so too was their solidarity – if it was good, full of taste and body you could rest assured that there was strong union traditions. Not sure about the theory but there is probably a PhD waiting to be written about it.

Over time Guinness re-invented itself – trying to escape that image of beardy folkies – soon some of the most imaginative adverts in the history of advertising were appearing on TV. When once I would have watched MTV for the latest video from whomever – now I thrilled to the latest bit of artistic genius from the Guinness team. By this time I was hanging out with a crowd that drank Guinness in the winter and cider in the summer – and that’s not a bad rule to follow.
Equally a bottle of Guinness in a stew is to be highly recommended, indeed a pint before you eat the stew is also to be recommended. In fact there is not the space to talk about the important relationship between food and Guinness, and in particular the potato, but perhaps on some later occasion we can return to this.

However, my most memorable involvement with the black stuff involved a bus, a billboard and a girl! One wintry Wednesday getting a bus into town after school I saddled up to the girl who my heart was set on at the time. I tried making some small talk but was getting nowhere fast and as the bus stalled in the traffic I noticed two large billboards. One had a squat round tin of paint on it and the other a tall half pint glass of Guinness. Inspired I told her she was just like that glass of Guinness on the billboard. “What?” she replied, her voice dripping with disdain. “Well” I stammered “you’re long, dark and slender, and have a lovely head on you.” She looked at me like I was mad. And though many a pint has been sunk since then I’m still convinced I was right – so I’ll raise a glass of the black stuff to ya Elaine Strange, Slainte.

Donal O’Hagan