Daily Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Bride-to-be Victoria awestruck by Shane
Clarke tells of her 30-year love affair with legendary Pogues singer Macgowan
SHANE Macgowan’s fiancee has told how she “became consumed” by the former Pogues’ singer.
As they prepare to get married, Victoria Mary Clarke said she fell head over heels for the legendary songwriter at 16.
The journalist, who has been at his side for more than 30 years, also revealed how she became awestruck by his “monstrous arrogance”.
The couple will tie the knot in Denmark today in an “unfussy” ceremony with no rings or white dress and with Hollywood actor Johnny Depp as the wedding guitarist.
Victoria said: “We met for the first time in a London pub when I was 16. Shane was unmiss- able, tall, pale and skinny, with jug ears and missing teeth, sporting a mobster Crombie and an air of monstrous arrogance.
“I was awestruck by him. I became consumed by the thought of him. He says he felt the same way, that we were destined to be together.
“But ours were not to be easy, uncomplicated lives and ours was not to be an uncomplicated love affair.
“We grabbed hold of each other and hung on for a ride that took us through a world of glamour and fame, creativity and ecstasy, drink, drugs and crazy, wild sex and on to madness, self-destruction and despair, violence, death, betrayal, rage separation and sadness and on and on towards revelation, renewal, compassion and hope.”
The 52 year-old, who got engaged to Shane in 2007, insisted when you meet “The One” you have a choice. She said: “You can dive in and marry them or wait until you are seeing each other in the light of having lived, no longer young, beautiful and indestructible”.
Writing in yesterday’s Sunday Independent, Victoria Mary said: “It is hard when you face the fact you may not be that perfect couple and you don’t know if you would want all that stuff.
“When the thought of a huge white wedding terrifies the life out of you. It can be embarrassing even, when people want to make a fuss on your behalf and you would rather be sitting quietly at home, watching the telly.
“And that’s not even mentioning the agony of choosing who should be invited.
“Shane and I are introverts and we decided the only solution was to elope together to someplace that we know nobody and nobody knows us, and keep it a secret. Which is what we have done.
“There will be a tiny civil ceremony in an anonymous city hall, there will be no white dress, nobody will be ‘given away’.
“There will be no flower girls or page boys or matrons of honours. We haven’t even got wedding rings.
“Bella Freud has given me a beautiful red dress. Johnny Depp is going to be the wedding guitarist. My nieces are going to do my make-up.
“My mother and sisters are bringing a cake and flowers. It will be weird but lovely. We may even have a speech.”
I was consumed by the thought of him. He felt the same VICTORIA MARY CLARKE YESTERDAY