Starting from the polyglot work of the Dublin-born and Skye-based Rody Gorman, who writes in Scottish and Irish Gaelic, English and his own invented translation of "intertonguing," this essay explores recent poetic connections between the two countries through readings of Irish poets who live or have lived in Scotland: the Gaelic and Irish peregrinations of David Wheatley, and the "minoritized diasporic" position of poets in English such as
This essay explores the trope of the island in recent Scottish poetry and in particular the tendency to treat poems as islands and vice versa. With a particular focus on the work of Meg Bateman, Jen Hadfield, Kathleen Jamie, Jackie Kay, and Liz Lochhead, the essay discusses ideas of entrapment, freedom, and isolation, to suggest that alongside the Utopian imaginings of islands, there is also the possibility of them becoming, like St Kilda for Lady Grange, constrictive prison cells.
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With 75 texts spanning three centuries (25 texts in each tongue: poems, prose extracts and songs), this anthology introduces the general reader to writing in the three minority tongues that coexist with the English language across the North Channel, in Scotland andthe nine counties of Ulster. Each text is accompanied by a visual image, a biographical note and a translation into English, making each two-page spread an elegant but succinct introduction to each author whose work is featured. The anthology also comprises three introductions (one for each language, with translation), an index of authors, a list of illustrations, and suggestions for further reading – making this also an ideal educational resource.
This chapter addresses the questions of how humans interact with the natural landscape and the status of poets – as opposed to scientists and activists – in this interaction. It focuses on the recent poetry of Kathleen Jamie in the context of contemporary ecocriticism and prose non-fiction accounts of Scottish ‘nature’ and especially the ‘wild’, including Jamie’s own Findings and Sightlines and the work of Robert McFarlane and Alasdair MacIntosh. The essay will address the extent to which our relationship with the environment is –problematically – portrayed as one of communion or community, and whether this is a re-emergence of (Utopian) versions of the pastoral, in which ‘nature’ is always already destroyed or necessarily forever beyond reach.
Sorley MacLean (1911-1996) was the greatest Gaelic poet of the 20th Century and one of the leading figures in the Scottish literary Renaissance. He is best known for his love poetry, for poems written while he was serving in Africa during the Second World War, forpoems exploring place and history, and for the long political poem 'An Cuilithionn'. His 1943 Dàin do Eimhir agus Dàin Eile is generally regarded the single-most important book published in Gaelic in the last century. This book offers the first single authored English language introduction to MacLean's work. It places MacLean's poetry in poetic, political and historical contexts, exploring its engagement with Gaelic traditions and other language literatures and also with contemporary philosophical and political movements. Discussing the entirety of MacLean's oeuvre – and offering in-depth case studies of individual poems and groups of poems – this introduction raises questions about translation and cultural ownership in modern Scotland, and shows how and why MacLean's work continues to resonate.
