By Amanda Estes

Staff Writer

    In his third novel, Petal on a Black Bough, Cape
Elizabeth resident Richard Cohen brings the mythological
warrior-goddess Medb back to life and inserts her into the World War I
to World War II era to aid in the struggle for Ireland’s independence.

    “People that know me have said, ‘What happened? This
isn’t you. You don’t write fantasy ’”said Cohen with a chuckle.

     Cohen, who called himself an “old academic,”
said the novel, which was published in April, marks his first attempt
at adding an element of fantasy to his writings, which he said
typically have a “historical bend.”

        A former English professor
and Vice President of Academic Affairs at the University of Maine,
Presque Isle, now retired, Cohen wrote a great deal of academic work
including reviews, articles and a monograph of the eighteenth century
writer Samuel Richardson. He was creator and editor of the journal,
Husson Review, and a participant in a National Endowment for the Arts
Grant for Images of Aroostook.  He also wrote chapters about
medicine in Aroostook county and the future of the county for a book
entitled: Aroostook: Land of Promise.

        Cohen said, however, he
never lost his interest in writing fiction. His previous novels, set
during the early to mid-twentieth century, are Be Still My Soul and
Monday: End of the Week. In 2005, Cohen also published a book of his
brother, Alfred Cohen, and his own poetry entitled Only God Can Make a
Tree.  With such a diverse catalog of works, it seems natural that
Cohen would take on a new challenge in his latest novel.  

        “I have always been
interested in mythology,” Cohen said, “and Celtic mythology is one of
my favorites. One of the reasons for that is we have drops of Irish
blood on my mother’s side in the family.”

    Medb or Maeve as it is written today, is known for
sorcery, sexuality and an affinity for war. She can travel through
space and time and shape shift from a young woman to an old woman or to
a raven. In the novel, Medb uses all of her powers to recruit warriors
to fight for Ireland’s independence.

    When Medb, disguised as nurse Lady Madeline, visits
a French hospital, she meets an American soldier named Philip. Philip
is the hero she has been searching for and she decides to use him as a
leader in the fight.

        “Unfortunately, for her, she
becomes too human and she falls in love with Philip and that leads to
some tragedy,” said Cohen, careful not to reveal too many details.

        In Celtic mythology and
perhaps in history, Cohen said, Medb, who history remembers as a queen,
had a daughter named Findbair. He said both mother and daughter died
from broken hearts from having sent so many men off to war. In the
novel, Medb’s heir, Maeve Dwyer lives in Massachusetts, having
immigrated there to escape Ireland’s poverty. Medb begins to bestow her
powers to her daughter and through this transformation Cohen said it is
revealed that what the world needs is love and peace.

        “A friend of mine wrote to
me and said my read is a multi-layered comment on mystery and life,
which for me was a very good comment,” he said. “I saw it described as
a romance and I laughed when I saw that.”

        If the novel is a romance,
it is perhaps more a case of the characters evolving off the page
rather than anything done intentionally by Cohen. He said authors are
telling the truth when they talk about their characters taking on a
life of their own.

        “They actually do,” he said.
“I had a character and she is, I would say, the central character in Be
Still My Soul and I remember once I was thinking about killing her off
and-this is the truth-I swear she said to me from the page, ‘You can’t
kill me off, you’re going to need me.’ He added, “They do talk and they
become real.”

        Be Still My Soul is a novel
about a different family dealing with the effects of World War II.
Cohen said it is about both the battlefield and the home front, but he
especially wanted to write about the experiences of the women who
stayed at home. Cohen said the novel conveys the “waste of war.”

        “I’m an idealist,” he said. “I want the world to live in harmony.”

        Cohen said he has thought about writing about the Iraq War, but decided against it.

        “We read about it, the world
reads about it daily…and I can’t do it,” he said. “I don’t think I’d do
it justice, at least not right now. Truthfully, I might be too angry
and you don’t want diatribe in a novel.”

        Cohen served in both the
army’s transportation and medical corps during World War II. Cohen said
he had three brothers overseas, but his commanding officer refused to
let him join them. He said he wrote to his superior every month, asking
to go overseas.

        “I went into the
headquarters (and) the captain was sitting there and he said, ‘Cohen,
is that another one of those letters?” Cohen recalled, laughing. “He
said, ‘I give you one of two choices: either I take it and tear it up
in front of you and throw it in my wastebasket or you take it and you
tear it up and throw it in yours.”

        Instead of going overseas,
Cohen was transferred from the transportation corps to the medical
corps. Coming from a family of physicians, it was assumed that he would
also be a doctor someday, but Cohen said he couldn’t do it.

        Cohen said his father,
Morris, was a “pioneer” in providing medical care for the poor and
working class. His next project will be completing his father’s
memoirs.

        “He started what was known
as the Boston Evening Clinic in 1927,” he said. “The Massachusetts
Medical Society was against him and all of the major hospitals in
Boston tried to stop him.”

        Cohen said the clinic grew
in size and fame and during the fifties or sixties, the Lord Mayor of
Dublin made a visit to the clinic.

        Depending on how the memoirs
turn out, Cohen said he might publish them. Once he finishes his
father’s memoirs, Cohen said his wife, Arla, has given him permission
to start work on his next novel. He said the next book will likely be
another historical fantasy and it will likely take place in seventeenth
century Ireland.

    Signed copies of Petal on a Black Bough are
available at Nonesuch Books in South Portland. At 7 p.m. on July 17,
Cohen will give a reading at Longfellow Books in Monument Square in
Portland. He will also appear at Borders in South Portland sometime in
either August or Sept.

    For more information about Cohen and his work, visit www.blackboughbooks.com.