РАЗДЕЛ V Страноведение стран изучаемых языков

Literature of Scotland: from the past times to our days

So my choosing of the theme wasn’t spontaneous. I have always been interested in literature in all its kinds especially in old myths and legends. School program tells pupils a lot about southern mythology – Egypt, India, Greece. Lessons of literature are mostly dedicated to Russian authors. Literature of other world remains unknown though it’s worth being read.

Why Scotland? This country is closer to me than any other because my brother studies in the Edinburgh University and I was lucky to have visited him twice in my life. I understood that Scotland has always lived in the shadow of England being in the same time very different from it. Scotland encouraged me by its magnificent landscapes, undiscovered wonders and people, who seem to be hard for emotions but become the real merrymen after Friday night in the nearest pub.

And all the circumstances have become the reason for the beginning of this work.

Looking at the map of the world you will easily find two quite big islands in the left-hand upper corner of the Eastern Hemispheres and many small islands around them. Nowadays they are occupied by two countries: The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the republic of Ireland.

For a long time these islands weren’t discovered by anybody. But at the end of BC era the Phoenicians reached the islands and learned about the existence of life there. The 40 tribes of islanders led simple life of farmers but they produced tin and lead – soft but useful metals. The Phoenicians began trading with the Britons and in the next several centuries many salesmen and other people moved from Europe to Britain.

The oldest tribes of inhabitants of the territory were the Picts. There is no full information about them, only legends, stories, guessings. They are surrounded by a romantic oriole and sung by many poets.

One of the first invaders were the Celts. They not only brought a developed culture to the islands but they actually took all of the lowlands and drove the local people to Scotland, Wales and Ireland. The Scots brought a new religion – Christianity – and the name of the country – Scotland. That is where the difference of the 4 nations of islanders began.

During the first century BC when Britain was being conquered by the Romans the spirit of the North showed all its strength. Caledonians, the self-name of the Scotts, resisted the Romans at every inch of land. They fought the bloodiest battles with them; they killed their wives and children not to let them become slaves. Such great number fell those days that some big hills are still supposed to be vast heaps of stones piled up above the warriors graves.

In 843 all Scottish lands were united under one king. Since that time Scotland supposed itself as an independent country though Scottish kings had sometimes accepted The English king as their Overlord. In 13th century after a quarrel for the Scottish throne an English king Edward the First was invited to rule the country. He was interested in the union of the lands but had no time for such activity in the moment. He put John de Balliol to the throne. Balliol made some unthought steps and rose a resistance movement in the nation. The head of the movement was Robert Bruce who had competed for the throne earlier. With the death of Edward it became easy for Bruce to take the throne, exile the British and promise that the Scotts would never accept English authority.

The next bloody point in the history of the Scotland is the story of Mary Stuart. In that time all Europe was Catholic and Mary who had grown up in France was Catholic too. But England and its queen Elizabeth were Protestant and saw a danger in a Catholic neighbour. So Mary was imprisoned for twenty years and then killed in 1587.

In 1707 English and Scottish parliaments were united and Protestantism became the ruling religion in the country. Most of the Scotts didn’t like such changes and joined the grandson of Catholic James the Second, Prince Charles Edward Stuart widely known as Bonnie Prince Charlie (bonnie means good-looking).

Charlie had a plan to return English crown to Scottish king. He easily took Edinburgh and started the intervention of England but changed his mind and suddenly decided to go back to Scotland. On his way back his tired army was defeated by the English. Charlie hid in Highlands and was saved by a girl-servant who gave him clothes of a poor person and sailed with him to the Island of Skye.

Now the times have passed. Scotland lives its quit life being more interested in what happens in it than I what happens in the other world.

The people of northern Britain spoke forms of Celtic languages. Much of the earliest Welsh literature was actually composed in or near the country now we call Scotland, as Brythonic speech was not then confined to Wales and Cornwall. While all modern scholarship indicates that the Picts spoke a Brythonic language (based on surviving placenames, personal names and historical evidence). None of their literature seems to have survived into the modern era in a written form. But there are some myths and legends still known and loved.

There are a few popular folklore creatures in Scotland.

The Banshees are little fairies who are usually dressed in white and often have long fair hair, which they brush with a silver comb. It is said that if you hear a banshee someone in the family will die, and if you see one in person you will die. The tale started many years ago, when a citizen died, a woman would sing a traditional lament or modern Irish caoinadh at his or her funeral.

A Brownie is a legendary elf popular in folklore around Scotland. The Brownies are said to inhabit houses and aid in tasks around the house. They do not like being seen and mostly come out at night and in exchange they get small gifts or a little food.

The Kelpie is a known to be a shape-shifting water horse that is believed to haunt the rivers and lochs of Scotland. He sometimes appears as a hairy man who would freighten travelers, but mostly he appears as an beautiful tame horse standing by a river or stream. The Kelpie is said to warn of forthcoming storms by wailing and howling.

Selkies are known to be creatures in the Irish and Scottish mythology that can transform themselves from seals to humans. The stories involving selkies are usually tragic romantic ones, where the selkie falls in love with a human, but after a while the selkie becomes restless and returns to sea. Sometimes the humans will not know that their lovers are selkies and they will just wake-up one morning to find them lost forever.

A trowe is a myth of the Orkney Islands, which is based on the Scandinavian troll. Trowe is Scots for troll. They are said to be naughty and small creatures who live in corners and mounds. Sea trowes live under water and are very lazy, they are nocturnal and even when they come out at night, they are invisible to many.

Searrach Uisge – a monster who was said to occupy Loch Suainbhal. Resembling a capsized boat, this creature has been reported swimming around for one and a half centuries. Locals say lambs were once offered annually to the creature. Other such creatures have been reported in several other lochs, including Loch Urubhal.

A family of werewolves, creatures who can transform from human being to wolves, were said to occupy an island on Loch Langavat. Although long deceased, they promised to rise if their graves were disturbed.

The ethnic language of the Scots was Gaelic. Gael was actually what the word Scot meant in English before the year 1500. Between years 1200 and 1700 the learned Gaelic elite of both Scotland and Ireland shared a literary form of Gaelic. It is possible that more Middle Irish literature was written in medieval Scotland than is often thought, but have not survived because the Gaelic literary establishment of eastern Scotland died out before the 14th century. Some Gaelic texts written in Scotland has survived in Irish sources. Gaelic literature written in Scotland before the 14th century includes the Lebor Bretnach, the product of a flourishing Gaelic literary establishment at the monastery of Abernethy.

The first known text to be composed in the form of northern Middle English spoken in the Lowlands (now called Early Scots) didn't appear until the fourteenth century. It is clear from John Barbour that the Fenian Cycle flourished in Scotland. There are allusions to Gaelic legendary characters in later Anglo-Scottish literature (oral and written).

In the 13th century, French flourished as a literary language, and produced the Roman de Fergus, the earliest piece of non-Celtic literature to come from Scotland. Moreover, many other stories in the Arthurian Cycle, written in French and preserved only outside Scotland, are thought by some scholars to have been written in Scotland.

In addition to French, Latin also was a literary language. Known examples would be the Inchcolm Antiphoner and the Carmen de morte Sumerledi, a poem which exults triumphantly the victory of the citizens of Glasgow over Somailre mac Gilla Brigte. And of course, the most important medieval work written in Scotland, the Vita Columbae, was also written in Latin.

Among the earliest Middle English or Early Scots literature is John Barbour's Brus (14th century).Considerable controversy has arisen regarding Barbour's literary work. If he is the author of the five or six long poems which have been ascribed to him by different writers, he adds to his importance as the father of Scots poetry the reputation of being one of the most voluminous writers in Early Scots, certainly the most voluminous of all Scots poets.

The Brus, in 14,000 lines and twenty books, is a narrative poem with a purpose partly historical, partly patriotic. It celebrates the praises of Robert the Bruce and the Black Douglas, the flowers of Scottish chivalry, opening with a description of the state of Scotland at the death of Alexander III (1286) and concluding with the death of Douglas and the burial of the Bruce's heart (1332). The central episode is the Battle of Bannockburn. Patriotic as the sentiment is, it is in more general terms than is found in later Scottish literature. The king is a hero of the chivalric type common in contemporary romance; freedom is a "noble thing" to be sought and won at all costs; the opponents of such freedom are shown in the dark colours which history and poetic propriety require; but there is none of the complacency of the merely provincial habit of mind. The lines do not lack vigour; and there are passages of high merit, notably the oft-quoted section beginning "A! freedom is a noble thing".

The seventeenth to early nineteenth century

Allan Ramsay (1686-1758) laid the foundations of a reawakening of interest in older Scottish literature, as well as leading the trend for pastoral poetry.

In 1760, James Macpherson claimed to have found poetry written by Ossian. He published translations which acquired international popularity, being proclaimed as a Celtic equivalent of the Classical epics. Fingal written in 1762 was speedily translated into many European languages, and its deep appreciation of natural beauty and the melancholy tenderness of its treatment of the ancient legend did more than any single work to bring about the Romantic movement in European, and especially in German, literature, influencing Herder and Goethe in his earlier period. It inspired many Scottish writers, including the young Walter Scott, but it eventually became clear that the poems were not direct translations from the Gaelic but flowery adaptations made to suit the aesthetic expectations of his audience (as has been demonstrated in Derick S. Thomson, The Gaelic Sources of Macpherson's "Ossian"

Among the best known Scottish writers are two who are strongly associated with the Romantic Era of seventeenth century, Robert Burns and Walter Scott.

Robert Burns is widely regarded as the national poet of Scotland, and is celebrated worldwide. He is the best-known of the poets who have written in the Scots language, although much of his writing is also in English and a 'light' Scots dialect, accessible to an audience beyond Scotland. He is regarded as a pioneer of the Romantic Movement. As well as making original compositions, Burns also collected folk songs from across Scotland, often revising or adapting them. His poem (and song) Auld Lang Syne is often sung at Hogmanay (New Year), and Scots Wha Hae served for a long time as an unofficial national anthem of the country.

Sir Walter Scott is a creator and a great master of the historical novels. He knew well that the historical process was full of conflicts. Observing reality, he came to understand the inevitability of the decay of the old and the victory of the new social forms. In some ways Scott was the first author to have a truly international career in his lifetime, with many contemporary readers all over Europe, Australia, and North America. His novels and poetry are still read, and many of his works remain classics of both English-language literature and of Scottish literature. Famous titles include Ivanhoe, Rob Roy, The Lady of Carolina, Waverley and The Heart of Johnson.

James Hogg, a writer encouraged by Walter Scott, made creative use of the Scottish religious background in producing his distinctive The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner, which can be seen as introducing the "doppelgänger" theme which would be taken up later in the century in The Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde. Hogg may have borrowed his literary motif from the concept of the "co-choisiche" in Gaelic folk tradition.

The nineteenth and early twentieth centuries

In the latter half of the nineteenth century the population of Scotland had become increasingly urban and industrialised. However, the appetite amongst readers, first whetted by Walter Scott, for novels about heroic exploits in a mythical untamed Scottish landscape, encouraged yet more novels that did not reflect the realities of life in that period.

A Scottish intellectual tradition, going back at least to the philosopher David Hume can be seen reflected in the Sherlock Holmes books of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle: although Holmes is now seen as part of quintessential London, the spirit of deduction in these books is arguably more Scottish than English.

Sir Arthur Ignatius Conan Doyle was a Scottish author most noted for his stories about the detective Sherlock Holmes, which are generally considered a major innovation in the field of crime fiction, and for the adventures of Professor Challenger. He was a prolific writer whose other works include science fiction stories, historical novels, plays and romances, poetry, and non-fiction.

Robert Louis (Balfour) Stevenson was a Scottish novelist, poet, and travel writer, and a leading representative of Neo-romanticism in English literature. He was the man who "seemed to pick the right word up on the point of his pen, like a man playing spillikins", as G.K. Chesterton put it. He was also greatly admired by many authors, including Jorge Luis Borges, Ernest Hemingway, Rudyard Kipling and Vladimir Nabokov. Most modernist writers dismissed him, however, because he was popular and did not write within their narrow definition of literature. It is only recently that critics have begun to look beyond Stevenson's popularity and allow him a place in the canon. Robert Louis Stevenson's most famous works are still popular and feature in many plays and films. The short novel Strange Case of Dr Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (1886) depicts the dual personality of a kind and intelligent physician who turns into a psychopathic monster after imbibing a drug intended to separate good from evil in a personality.

The introduction of the movement known as the "kailyard tradition" at the end of the 19th century, brought elements of fantasy and folklore back into fashion. J.M. Barrie is one example of this mix of modernity and nostalgia. This tradition has been viewed as a major stumbling block for Scottish literature, focusing, as it did, on an idealised, pastoral picture of Scottish culture, becoming increasingly removed from reality of life in Scotland during that period. This tradition was satirised by the author George Douglas Brown in his novel The House with the Green Shutters. It could be argued that Scottish literature as a whole still suffers from the echoes of this tradition today.

One Scottish author whose work has become popular again is the cleric George MacDonald.

In the early 20th century in Scotland, a renaissance in the use of Lowland Scots occurred, its most vocal figure being Hugh MacDiarmid. Other contemporaries were A.J. Cronin, Eric Linklater, Naomi Mitchison, James Bridie, Robert Garioch, Robert McLellan, Nan Shepherd, William Soutar, Douglas Young, and Sidney

Goodsir Smith. However, the revival was largely limited to verse and other literature. Sorley MacLean's work in Scottish Gaelic in the 1930s gave new value to modern literature in that language. Edwin Muir advocated, by contrast, concentration on English as a literary language.

The novelists Neil M. Gunn and Lewis Grassic Gibbon emphasised the real linguistic conflict occurring in Scottish life during this period in their novels in particular, The Silver Darlings and A Scots Quair respectively, where we can see the language of the protagonists grows more anglicised progressively as they move to a more industrial lifestyle.

New writers of the postwar years displayed a new outwardness.

Both Alexander Trocchi in the 1950s and Kenneth White in the 1960s left Scotland to live and work in France.

Edwin Morgan became known for translations of works from a wide range of European languages.Edwin Morgan is the current Scots Makar (the officially-appointed national poet, equivalent to a Scottish poet laureate) and also produces translations of world literature. His poetry covers the current and the controversial, ranging over political issues, and academic debates.One notable phenomenon has been Tartan Noir, although the authenticity of the genre has been disputed.

The tradition of fantastical fiction is continued by Alasdair Gray, whose Lanark has become a cult classic since its publication in 1981. The 1980s also brought attention to writers capturing the urban experience and speech patterns – notably James Kelman and Jeff Torrington.

The works of Irvine Welsh, most famously Trainspotting, are written in a distinctly Scottish English, and reflect the underbelly of contemporary Scottish culture. Other commercial writers, Iain Banks and Ian Rankin have also achieved international recognition for their work, and, like Welsh, have had their work adapted for film or television.

Alexander McCall Smith, Alan Warner, and Glasgow-based novelist Suhayl Saadi, whose short story "Extra Time" is in Glaswegian Scots, have made significant literary contributions in the 21st century.

Scottish Gaelic literature is currently experiencing a revival in print, with the publishing of An Leabhar Mòr and the Ùr Sgeul series, which encouraged new authors of poetry and fiction.

The Scottish literature canon has in recent years opened up to the idea of including women authors, encouraging a revisiting of Scottish women's work from past and present.

In recent years the publishing house Canongate Books has become increasingly successful, publishing Scottish literature from all eras, and encouraging new literature.

Now we can see that Scottish literature has its own style, different from any other in the world. Every word of Scottish legends, poems, and novels is full of romance, mystery and patriotism – then it is not surprising why Scottish literate works are read in every educated family.

It becomes clear why every peace of Scottish literature is worth reading. Nowadays in the time of machines and Practicality such feelings as Scottish literature awakes in us are so seldom met that we must save every little part of it.

But I am sure that not only literature of Scotland can influence people in this positive way but literature of every country can. Often we forget it because we range only few famous books by our attention and don’t try to find something unknown to open public.
LITERATURE

1. 
   Wikipedia, the Free Encyclopedia www.wikipedia.com
   
2. 
   Speak Out. // A Journal For English Students (1-2/1998)
   
3. 
   Read and speak about Britain and the British” ( V. F. Satinova)
   
4. 
   British literature and Culture. Part 1. (V. Safonova, L. Kuzmina, E. Smirnova)
   
5. 
   Foreign languages. // A Science Journal for Teachers (1-2/2002)