Academic Journal 9 - Ourselves Alone (Malachy)

At the risk of derision by my classmates, I stand by my belief that there is textual evidence that Malachy is beginning to change for the better at the end of the play.
Despite the fact that the unborn child is half-British and the son of Joe, a (suspected) traitor to the Republican movement, Malachy defends it. Liam, the child’s uncle, wants to kill it because it is Joe’s child, but Malachy stops him aggressively, declaring himself the father, saying it is “[his] baby now . . . [his] blood” (79), and making clear that he will protect the child from anyone who would harm it. This is surprising, given Malachy’s pattern of hard-line Republicanism and threatening nature. He is taking his daughter and her child under his protection and back into his home; yes, this gives him power over her, but I don’t believe that this is his ultimate goal. A classmate argued that he is taking the child in so that he can manipulate it, train it to be a good little soldier, but I think this is unsupported. First of all, he already has a grandchild whose father (Liam) was imprisoned, thus effectively fatherless. Why didn’t Malachy take in Donna and her child, which was also his blood, to begin training Catherine as the next generation of messenger/servant? Perhaps it is because it is a granddaughter that he never took them in, taking in this child in hopes of raising a soldier, but for starters we don’t know the gender of the child; it could easily be another girl. In addition, the kid won’t be usable for the IRA for several years, and in the meantime represents a substantial risk to Malachy and his cohorts. An infant will make it harder to move in a hurry if the police come, and will require care, attention and resources that now can’t go to the cause. If Malachy is a cold enough bastard to take in a child just to raise a soldier, he’s cold enough to wait until it’s old enough to be usable.
Is Malachy a nice guy? Probably not. Has he had a Joycean Epiphany? Unlikely. Will he continue to terrorize and manipulate his family, up to and including putting them to work in dangerous positions at a young age? Probably – but his reaction to the coming baby at the end of the play leads me to believe that he HAS changed over the course of events, and that those changes are for the better.