His first flight

--Liam O’Flaherty

The author and the text :

Liam O'therty (1896 -1984) was a significant Irish novelist and short story writer and a major figure in the irish literary renaissance. His most famous books include The Informer, Return of the Brute, House of Gold etc. His First Flight, a short story which symbolizes the nervousness one experiences before doing something new, is regarded as one of his most famous works.

The following text, an abridged version of this short story, is about a young seagull and his experience of learning how to fly. The story focuses on how fear must be conquered before one may achieve anything of significance, like the young seagull who had in be brave in order tofiy

The young seagull was alone on his ledge. His two brothers and his sister had already flown away the day before. He had been afraid to fly with them. When he had run forward to the brink of the ledge he became afraid. The great expanse of the sea stretched down beneath, and it was miles down. He felt certain that his wings would never support hlm. So he bent his head and ran away back to the little hole where he slept at night. His father and mother had come around calling to him shrilly. But for the life of him he could not move.

That was twenty-four hours ago. Since then nobody had come near him. The day before, he had watched his parents flying about with his brothers and sister. They Were teaching them the art of flight and how to dive for fish. He had seen his elder brother catch his first herring, while his parents circled around proudly.

The sun was now ascending the sky, blazing warmly on his ledge that faced the south. He felt the heat because he had not eaten since the previous nightfall. Now there was not a single scrap of food left in the straw nest. His little grey body trotted back and forth on the ledge. He was trying to find some means of reaching his parents without having to fly. But on each side of him the ledge ended in a sheer fall, with the sea beneath. He could surely reach them without flying if he could only move northwards along the cliff. But then on what could he walk? There was no ledge, and he was not a fly.

He stepped slowly out to the brink of the ledge. He stood on one leg with the other leg hidden under his wing. Closing one eye and then the other, he pretended to be falling asleep. Still his parents took no notice of him. He saw his two brothers and his sister lying on the plateau. They were dozing, with their heads sunk into their wings. His father was preening his feathers on his white back. Only his mother was looking at him. She was standing on a little high hump on the plateau, eating a piece of fish. The sight of the food maddened him.

”Ge, ga, ga," he cried, begging her to bring him some food. ”Gaw-ool-ah,” she screamed back. He kept calling, and after a minute or so, he uttered a joyful scream. His mother had picked up a piece of fish and was flying across to him with it. But when she was just opposite to him, she halted, her wings motionless. The piece of hsh in her beak was almost within reach of his beak. He waited a moment in surprise, wondering why she did not come nearer. And then, maddened by hunger, he dived at the fish.

With a loud scream he fell outwards and downwards into space. Then terror seized him and his heart stood still. But it only lasted a moment. The next moment he felt his wings spread outwards. The wind rushed against his breast feathers, then under the stomach and against his wings. He could feel the tips of his wings cutting through the air. He was not falling headlong now. He was soaring gradually downwards and outwards. He was no longer afraid. Then he flapped his wings once and he soared upwards. He uttered a joyous scream and flapped them again. He soared higher. His mother flew past him, her wings making a loud noise. He answered her with another scream. Then his father flew over him, screaming. Then he saw his two brothers and his sister flying around him.

He saw a vast green sea beneath him, and he turned his beak sideways and crowed amusedly. His parents and his brothers and sister had landed on this green floor in front of him. They were beckoning to him, calling shrilly. He dropped his legs to ttand on the green sea

His feet sank into the sea, and then his belly touched it and he sank no further. He was floating on it. And around him his family was screaming, pralsmg him.

He had made his first flight.