The trouble with Halloween isn’t just, as Rachel Johnson points out today, that it’s the occasion for large scale larceny by the young and conspicuous ghoul-related consumption by adults on an indecent scale; it’s also a loathsome revenant of its former self. I grew up with Halloween in its old form in Ireland and I can tell you right now that no one thought of spending money on imitation spider webbing, let alone zombie exclusion placards and no one resorted to pumpkins of any description — this was the turnip era. But then that was the time before Halloween, having been taken to America by Irish migrants, returned to Ireland and Britain in a hideous and unrecognisable form.
We did indeed dress up in something scary on Halloween night – face masks, with your father’s coats and hats or a sheet — and go in groups from door to door asking for a penny for the bobbin’. What we got in return were apples, nuts (we were particularly fond of monkey-nuts, or raw peanuts) and coins. We’d divvy these out on our return and some would be put in a basin of water into which we’d dive to retrieve them and obviously the coins on the bottom would be hardest. Then there’d be the usual business of hanging an apple on a string to eat, one on each side. And there’s be Barmbrack, a yeasted fruit cake, sliced and eaten with butter.
