The Emperor of Ice-Cream (novel)
The Emperor of Ice-Cream is a 1965 coming-of-age novel by writer Brian Moore. Set in Belfast during the Second World War, it tells the story of 17-year-old Gavin Burke who, admitting “War was freedom, freedom from futures,” defies his Nationalist and Catholic family by volunteering as an air raid warden with the largely Protestant ARP. The novel takes you through Gavin's journey as he realises that there are those on the other side of the city's bitter communal division whose friendships offer a wider horizon.
Based in part on Moore's own wartime experiences, he described it as the most autobiographical of his novels. Moore left Belfast in 1943 to join the British Ministry of War Transport and worked himself for a period with the ARP in London.
The title taken from Wallace Stevens' poem "The Emperor of Ice-Cream."
