Our Statues of Hanoverian Kings in Scotland

Along Edinburgh's George street are the statues – King George IV, William Pitt the Younger and Prince Albert astride his horse in Charlotte Square. At the far end of George street there is a new (2008) statue to the forgotten and now remembered scientist James Clerk Maxwell. In Edinburgh’s new town the streets are named after the German Hanoverian Kings – streets Frederick, Anne, Hanover, George. I noticed on my walk there last summer for my visit to its major festival.

While on Princes street there is a tall black Gothic monument to the writer Walter Scott - some believe was a unionist but was actually, as are most of Scotland's writers and poets - a nationalist. 

I discovered recently there is a statue to our national bard, Robert Burns, at the bottom of Leith walk that I used to pass every day on my bus to secondary school at Granton. 

David Hume

Does all this matter? In some respects yes. All these labels are significantly unionist and royalist .How would it be if the streets were named after the Stewart kings and a statue of Robert the Bruce, a statue of hero William Wallace or John Knox dominated James or Stewart street instead!

Over in Glasgow's George Square there is a more relevant, if slightly strange, mixture of statues of the Victorian era and the time when Glasgow’s Tobacco Lords did well out of the Empire and union – statues of Walter Scott, James Watt, Robert Burns, chemist Thomas Graham, Prince Albert, Robert Peel, Gladstone, Queen Victoria, Jimmy Oswald, Lord Clyde, Tam Campbell, John Moore, some soldiers and those lions.  

There are also no statues to women (as if all great women are air brushed out).  There has been a campaign recently for a statue to the great female reformer Mary Barbour in Glasgow.

 

Prince Albert

And surely to have the statue to our great Robert Burns hidden down Leith is truly shocking. So my first thought is a statue to Burns at the Mound! I might wish. Or a statue to the great democracy reformer Thomas Muir.

 

George IV

In Edinburgh there are two statues of dogs and two of Queen Victoria and 200 statues of men. Up near St Giles on the Royal Mile are more statues to great men – David Hume (philosopher and economist), Duke of Buccleuch, Adam Smith, James Braidwood, Charles II.  

Burns in George Square Glasgow

Yes I know we have mostly lived in a patriarchal society, where women’s roles have been swept aside – as mothers, supporters, carers. The more I read though, the more I discover that women have been essential to many great men and also for society in general – and sadly their input has mostly been forgotten and air brushed out.

Of course its not long ago that women were given the vote (and non-land owning men) and given entry to university education - so I guess it takes time for change to happen!  I just read that there will be a statue to singer Cilla Black in Liverpool.

BLOG to follow on Great Scottish Women

Poet James Macpherson & OSSIAN

I read of the Ossian poems and their effect on Robert Burns. When I went to research this blog I was astonished at his story!  The author of the epic poems of Ossian - supposedly about the Celtic hero Fingal (more later). At this time in the late 18th century there was a rebirth in romantic thinking which led to the Romantic movement which has a big impact on all the arts in Europe.  

(1736 – 1796) was a Scottish writer, poet, literary collector and politician, known for his interpretations of  the Ossian poems. He was the first Scottish poet to gain an international reputation.

Macpherson's work - The Highlander (1758); 1760 as Fragments of Ancient Poetry collected in the Highlands of Scotland; 1761 Fingal, an Ancient Epic Poem in Six Books, together with Several Other Poems composed by Ossian, the Son of Fingal, translated from the Gaelic Language and written in musical measured prose. 1765 Temora, The Works of Ossian in 1765

When the epic Ossian poems were published by the Scottish poet James MacPherson  in 1760  - a fantasy of a third century Gaelic bard who wrote of a Celtic hero named Fingal - they achieved success  internationally. The general consensus today is that Macpherson was the author and had based them on ancient Gaelic folk tales. According to the clan Donald site Fingal of the Ossian poems was based on the Greatest Hero of the Celtic Race -  (Somerled) Somhairlidh mac Gillebride mhic Gilledomnan.  and not an ancient Irish hero as some made out at all. 

Did Macpherson equate the Scottish hero to Irish legend, in order to have his works published at all? At this time, after the Jacobite 45 wars, Highland culture was being severely repressed (the punishment was Transportation). Poetic license in other words and one of the beauties of poetry - that we can express ideas, concepts and beliefs we cannot so clearly in prose. The Scottish Highlands then became "a place of great beauty and romance - rather than one of wild warriors and hardships." (Tom  Devine).

The Clan Donald site believes Fingal was based on the renowned Celtic warrior king (Somerled) Somhairlidh mac Gillebride mhic Gilledomnan -  who died in Renfrew 1160 fighting the Scots. He was king of Argyle and the Western Isles. They believe the works were poor translations and that Macpherson deliberately wrote under the Ossian name  - as a fantasy to associate the ancient Gaelic poems to Ireland. They believe he did so to protect himself, as after the Jacobite 45 wars the English decided to repress the Highland culture and way of life.  

Herder, Goethe, Napoleon, Diderot, Burns, Scott and Voltaire were great admirers of the poems. Thomas Jefferson thought Ossian "the greatest Poet that has ever existed". They were proclaimed as the Celtic equivalent of the classical writers such as Homer.  Painters and composers chose Ossianic subjects.  The poems also influenced the composers Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Mendelssohn who expressed the freedom of Romanticism. Schubert composed Lieder set to many of Ossian's poems. Mendelssohn was inspired to visit the Hebrides and composed the Hebrides overture, Fingal's Cave.  Poets, Byron, Coleridge, Wordsworth and Yeats were also influenced. Lady Jane Wild named her son Oscar Fingal Wilde (the Irish poet and playwright) after the writer of the romantic Ossian poems....

Robert Burns mentioned Ossian in the footnotes of his first book of poems. He too wished to be a national bard (Poems in mostly in the Scots Dialect 1786). After the success of Burns poems, other nations such as England wished to have their own national bard too.  The Ossian poems were part of the glorification of heroic individuals and artists. By contrast Burns social democratic background was of the people and nature with quite modern and environmental views (like Tolstoy) he understood the importance of valuing all life - from the smallest creature to the highest lord. 

The Clan Donald site believes Fingal was based on the renowned Celtic warrior king (Somerled) Somhairlidh mac Gillebride mhic Gilledomnan -  who died in Renfrew 1160 fighting the Scots. He was King of Argyle and the Western Isles. They believe the works were poor translations and that Macpherson deliberately wrote under the Ossian name  - as a fantasy to associate the ancient Gaelic poems to Ireland. They believe he did so to protect himself from Transportation as after the Jacobite 45 wars, the English repressed the Highland culture and way of life.  

Clan Donald James Macpherson Ossian poems - http://www.clandonald-heritage

Scottish Poets

The stories we tell and pass on through our songs and poets inform and illuminate who we are, how we wish others to see us and how we view our future and past. 

I studied higher 'English' at school and also at college in Edinburgh. I am sad that I never learnt of Burn's story or of other Scottish stories or poets. Has Scottish history, arts and music been suppressed the past decades? Of course it has! - and often deliberately.  Robert Crawford mentions how the establishment sought to 'tone down' Robert Burns.

** THE SCOTTISH VISIONARIES

In the 1930s there was a Scottish Enlightenment that happened in Montrose led by poet Hugh MacDiarmid. He is one of Scotland's leading contemporary poets and a founding member of Scotland's national party.

*Liz Lochhead, Scottish poet, playwright, translator and broadcaster. She has been the Scottish Makar  2011 - 2016, or National Poet of Scotland. She is a great character and I have met her and taken her photo at Edinburgh International book festival (EIBF).

* James MacPherson

I read of the Ossian poems and their effect on Robert Burns. When I went to research this blog I was astonished at his story! (more on another blog) The author of the epic poems of Ossian - supposedly about the Celtic hero Fingal (more later). At this time in the late 18th century there was a rebirth in romantic thinking which led to the Romantic movement and had a big impact on all the arts in Europe. Macpherson tapped into this revival and had huge international success. Today most accept that he used poetic licence to create his own Celtic hero. 

According to the clan Donald site Fingal of the Ossian poems was based on the Greatest Hero of the Celtic Race -  (Somerled) Somhairlidh mac Gillebride mhic Gilledomnan.  (and not an ancient Irish hero as some made out at all).  Did Macpherson equate the Scottish hero to Irish legend, in order to have his works published at all? At this time, after the Jacobite 45 wars, Highland culture was being severely repressed (the punishment was Transportation) Poetic license in other words - and one of the beauties of poetry - that we can express ideas, concepts and beliefs we cannot so clearly in prose.   The Scottish Highlands suddenly became a place of great beauty and romance - rather than one of wild warriors and hardships.

*Robert Burns.  Then there is of course our very famous national bard , the incomparable Robert Burns, who is revered and admired the world over. Especially in Russia, where they value the great emotional sweep that Burns expresses in his poetry.  In the footnotes to his first Book of Poems Mostly in the Scots Dialect 1786, Burns mentionedcxccc Ossian and how he too wanted to be a national bard. After this other countries, such as England, also wanted to have a national poet.

SCOTTISH POETS

Robert Burns, Robert Fergusson, Edwin Morgan, Walter Scott, James MacPherson,

Hamish Henderson, Frances Wright, Robert Louis Stevenson, Arthur Conan Doyle, Liz Lochhead, Hugh MacDiarmid, Jackie Kay, Norman MacCaig, Sorley MacLean .... and more. 

Scottish Writers Museum?

We lack a serious and expansive writers museum in Edinburgh on the scale of Dublin's which is housed in a impressive Georgian mansion -  most of our great writers are not represented properly. It is a massive disgrace. I believe there is talk of housing a new decent sized Scottish Writers Museum perhaps near the Scottish National Library in George IV bridge?   The present one is in Lady Stairs Close up a winding narrow staircase has poor access. And only houses three Scottish writers - Burns, Scott and Stevenson.   

I heard an Irish lady remark at Celtic - when I mentioned the Scottish Writers museum and the wonderful Irish writers museum she remarked that Scotland had few great writers!  

 Much of Scottish culture has been lost and forgotten - so that the teachers are no longer able to pass on . Unless we stand on the shoulders of greatness we are as nothing. 

The Scottish Visionaries.  One of the highly interesting aspects of the SNP and Scottish nationalism is that it is primarily inclusive and outward looking.  Is this because it was started by visionary poets - Robert Burns,  Hugh MacDiarmid and others?

What is civic nationalism?

It is not about any national superiority or about being narrow and inward looking - as compared to other right wing nationalist parties. Rather it is about our past stories. 

Scottish A Cappella National Championships

Tone Up

The Killers Quinns

enjoyed a fun night at the Scottish A Cappella National Championships St Andrews University on Friday 4th March - with The Accidentals, The Belles, Aberpella, the Killer Quines, The Other Guys, The Hummingbirds, Tone Up, Edinburgh University A Cappella Society

The Belles

The Accidentals

Aberpella