Postcards from the Edge

Just like us, horses can be dozy or go-getting, and it’s all thanks to their genes, writes Mary Kenny

My late husband, the journalist Richard West, used to call anything sounding somewhat implausible ‘Irish science’.

‘I suppose that’s Irish science,’ he’d jest, when I said the reason you can’t see the white cliffs of Calais from the Dover coast except in the afternoon is that the tilt of the earth alters the focus of light.

I wouldn’t argue back because I knew I was right. And, anyway, a man sometimes needs to scoff at his wife’s ideas to hold up his side, and protect his masculine amour-propre.

But now that Ireland has become so smart, Irish science is tops. Of the world’s 25 top biotechnical and pharmaceutical companies, 24 are in Ireland. The Jewish schools in Dublin are oversubscribed because so many brainy Israelis have come to work in Ireland, bringing their children.

And here’s my favourite recent piece of Irish bio-scientific research. Studies at University College Dublin demonstrate that some horses win races because they have a ‘can-do attitude’, while some nags lose them because they have fundamental ‘couch potato’ personalities. Certain equines have a ‘motivator’ gene, while others just can’t be bothered.

The boffins at UCD, in partnership with equine science company Plusvital, researched 4,500 thoroughbreds and found that horses have an individual sense of motivation, known as the PRCP gene.

Winners and losers at Cheltenham aren’t produced just by sound bloodstock or skilful trainers, as we always thought. Studying the form of the dam and the sire will not necessarily produce the likely winner. We would really have to know the genetic make-up of each gee-gee to put money on its getting first past the post.

Professor Emmeline Hill, the Irish horse geneticist who discovered the gene for equine speed, says this ‘can-do’ attitude is discernible even among foals and yearlings. The youngsters with this positive ‘motivator’ gene are almost training themselves from the get-go, using early horseplay to build up stamina and strength for the track.

Horse genetics are evidently a marvellous area of research. Thank God, there is still some element of chance in this particular Irish science – else it would hardly be worth having a flutter at all. Genetics don’t account for absolutely everything, says Professor Hill. We can still be surprised.

Her renown in her field – ha ha – also owes something to genetics. Her grandmother Charmian Hill was the first woman in Ireland to ride against men in public races, and rode her famous mare, Dawn Run, winner of the Cheltenham Gold Cup, at the age of 62. She was known as the ‘galloping granny’ in her native County Wexford.

Another oldie triumph!

There’s an exquisite exhibition of the Impressionist painter Berthe Morisot at the Musée d’orsay in Paris (until 22nd September).

I do wonder sometimes if art and culture have become too popular. Art exhibitions are now frequently full to bursting point. Even when you have booked a slot, you often have to queue, and then strain to view the pictures behind vast crowds of Japanese and Chinese tourists (who love the delicate colours of the Impressionists) or Italians doing commentary at full volume. And everyone seems to be taking a selfie in front of the paintings.

Morisot (1841-95) was a most engaging painter, now experiencing a new vogue as a reinvented feminist. Yet what’s striking about her subject matter is how feminine, and domestic, is her focus. She loved babies and children.

The Musée d’orsay has a great back story. It was an Art Deco railway station, due for demolition in 1970, when culture minister Jacques Duhamel saved it from the wrecking ball at the last minute, hoping to make it a hotel. More enlightened counsels turned it into an art gallery and when you approach it now (Métro: Solférino), there are queues around the block.

That famed Hollywood wag Sam Goldwyn (of Metro Goldwyn Mayer) once enthused about a novel with a strong lead female character. He’d acquire the rights – it would make a great movie. ‘But we can’t, Mr Goldwyn,’ said his entourage. ‘The heroine is a lesbian!’ ‘Well, make her an American!’ he replied.

Today, our gay heroine would be a big box-office draw even as an American. But Lesbos, the name of the Sapphic isle, is now more associated with distress than with gay pride. The Continental media describe Lesbos, with its teeming population of refugees living in squalor, as a disgrace to the EU. Most of the 5,000 camp dwellers come from Syria, Afghanistan and Turkey, and many dream of a life in Europe, via Greece.

According to Médicins Sans Frontières, there are severe mental-health problems among the refugees, and the natives of Lesbos are in despair about their island. They blame the already unpopular EU.

Even Sam Goldwyn might hesitate to utter a wisecrack about the Lesbos situation today.