The Rainy City

Manchester and the Rain

Manchester is known for its rain. That's something that Mancunians will swear blind to. When I came here years ago to check out MMU as a possible university, one of the lectures boasted about it, like the rain was a badge of honour. I suppose with so many clouds in the sky, you need to find that silver lining.

Living here I found just how real that reputation is. There has always been something more about the rain here like it was heavier. For most people, I'm likely talking nonsense, but some might get it. There's something about Mancunian rain that's just more.

I guess that's the power of myth for you, a mind will always fill in the expected.

Rain in writing is often used as a form of pathetic fallacy, a way to heighten the emotions of characters, or better set the scene. If Manchester were a city lifted from the pages of a run-of-the-mill novel, sadness and depression would mar every chapter. The rain would pour through the letters, dampening and muting every aspect of the world. Because that's what rain does, that's the connotation, the myth, that we're accustomed to.

Before the pandemic people in Manchester stayed in. Avoiding the rain at all costs, sprinting from house to bus or car, and generally attempting to escape the hassle of damp clothes and wet feet. Now, however, as things are starting to open up again, the rain is a kind of welcome experience. There's an odd beauty in the act of returning to those old norms. A comfort in once against having to undergo the inconveniences that were so common only a year and a half ago. The annoyance of being caught in the rain is overshadowed by the very notion that you have somewhere to go at all. It's as surreal as it is beautiful.

This rain, this fundamental part of Mancunian life, is pervasive. So much so, that despite my writing being set largely in Ireland and Dublin, the rain has flooded onto the page alongside the rest. I can't help but wonder if this is a common experience, whether writers often find their worlds tinged with their reality. Whatever the case may be, the current heatwave certainly puts a dampener on the claims of this Rainy City.

I'll enjoy it while it lasts. Until the clock ticks its time again...