James Joyce and nationalism in language
Andrew Clarke
thanks also to Colin Wilson for explaining "lallans" : my mock-Tudor
metaphor used of McDiarmid meant pretty well that the poetic thought
seemed to be in modern Scots, with some archaisms tacked on.
I've just read in the Weekly Telegraph [that's the weekly version
of the Daily/Sunday Telegraph that expatriates get (on the end of a
spear)] a review of a play based on Grassic Gibbon's A Scottish Quair [sp?].
The reviewer found the play unintelligible for the first few minutes, and then
gradually began to comprehend it.
BTW it must be one thing to publish verse or short short stories in Scots or
Geordie or Broard Yorkshire -- a few pages in a magazine will suffice --
but the economics of publishing novels or monographs in non-RSE must be
fairly terrible -- the audience for literature is small enough in RSE without
limiting yourself to a subset of that audience before you even start.
Joyce -- the Cyclops section of Ulysses should be required reading for
nationalists of whatever stamp. That's the one in the bar with The Citizen
and the dog and Bloom getting into trouble over a horse-race (and his
Jewish ancestry), interspersed with yards of highflown stuff about the New
Ireland that contrasts so pointedly with The Citizen and his entourage in
Bloomsday itself. The Citizen, to be sure, knows a smattering of Irish
Gaelic, but the only other to speak it is Haines, the awful Englishman,
and the peasant woman who comes with the milk thinks it's French he's talking.
And the only Irish-English word that Joyce makes a fuss over is that
tundish in A Portrait of the Artist. And yet Joyce's Irishness shines out
of every line he wrote -- possibly even in Finnegan's Wake. Not in a
narrowing sense, but as part of the Modernist project to grasp as much of
European culture as possible (cf Pound, Eliot, Lawrence). After Modernism,
we seem to be turning around and facing inwards again, as every minority
in Europe tries to separate out, even when -- as in Eastern Europe -- the
consequences are, as they always have been, catastrophic.
Hope this works,
Andrew Clarke (a...@libserver.canberra.edu.au)
K Stephen
>I've just read in the Weekly Telegraph [that's the weekly version
>of the Daily/Sunday Telegraph that expatriates get (on the end of a
>spear)] a review of a play based on Grassic Gibbon's A Scottish Quair [sp?].
Just to be pedantic its a Scots Quair.
>The reviewer found the play unintelligible for the first few minutes, and then
>gradually began to comprehend it.
>BTW it must be one thing to publish verse or short short stories in Scots or
>Geordie or Broard Yorkshire -- a few pages in a magazine will suffice --
>but the economics of publishing novels or monographs in non-RSE must be
non-RSE, what that?
I take it that is (perhaps) Royal Standard English?
>fairly terrible -- the audience for literature is small enough in RSE without
>limiting yourself to a subset of that audience before you even start.
[Joyce deleted]
>Hope this works,
>Andrew Clarke (a...@libserver.canberra.edu.au)
I haven't seen 'A Scots Quair' but I have seen a couple of other plays
in Scots. One was in the dialect of Caithness. It was essential that the
language of that area and time was used for authenticity of
characterisation. This is entirely relevant when the difference between
the classes are central to the play.
Of course there is another simple reason for using Scots and that is
because it is still spoken (admittedly diluted) in some areas. It is a natural
method of communication for many.
Why should Scots die just because it sells more books etc if the play is
written in English.
Karl Stephen.
Morna.Findlay
>I've just read in the Weekly Telegraph [that's the weekly version
>of the Daily/Sunday Telegraph that expatriates get (on the end of a
>spear)] a review of a play based on Grassic Gibbon's A Scottish Quair [sp?].
>The reviewer found the play unintelligible for the first few minutes, and then
>gradually began to comprehend it.
That'll be TAG Theatre Company's trilogy - A Sunset Song, Cloud Howe and Grey
Granite, which is on at the festival just now.
I'm going to see "A Sunset Song" on Saturday and maybe the others afterwards
if I have the energy.
This has had fairly good reviews so far, though one reviewer criticised
the protrayal of Chris Guthrie ( the herioine ) as " an ordinary woman"
which of course she isn't.
I am looking forward to seeing it.
M
--
Morna Findlay JANET:mo...@uk.ac.ed.dcs
Thanksgiving For a National Victory (Robert Burns)
Ye hypocrites! are these your pranks? To murder men and give God thanks?
Desist, for shame! Proceed no further: God won't accept your thanks for murther.
Colin Wilson
|> I've just read in the Weekly Telegraph [that's the weekly version
|> of the Daily/Sunday Telegraph that expatriates get (on the end of a
|> spear)] a review of a play based on Grassic Gibbon's A Scottish Quair [sp?].
|> The reviewer found the play unintelligible for the first few minutes, and then
|> gradually began to comprehend it.
|> BTW it must be one thing to publish verse or short short stories in Scots or
|> Geordie or Broard Yorkshire -- a few pages in a magazine will suffice --
|> but the economics of publishing novels or monographs in non-RSE must be
|> fairly terrible -- the audience for literature is small enough in RSE without
|> limiting yourself to a subset of that audience before you even start.
The language of "A Scots Quair" is intelligible to everyone raised in
Scotland, even if they don't use it themselves. The potential audience is
of the order of five million people, more than some languages with official
status in their respective countries, in which no-one would even think of
questioning the wisdom of producing literature. Work in Danish, for instance,
has a maximum potential audience of three and a half million. Going further,
I'm sure that no-one would question the wisdom of performing drama in
Icelandic, a language with a maximum potential audience about the same
size as the population of Aberdeen.
I'm afraid that you are making the mistake - although to be fair to you,
you are far from being the first English person to make it, and I'm sure
that you are far from being the last - of imagining that Scotland can be
compared with regions of England, such as Yorkshire and Northumbria, in
its area and population. Needless to say, it can't.
|> After Modernism,
|> we seem to be turning around and facing inwards again, as every minority
|> in Europe tries to separate out, even when -- as in Eastern Europe -- the
|> consequences are, as they always have been, catastrophic.
Can we have some clarification, please, about what is being implied here?
Are you suggesting that linguistic diversity leads, in general, to violent
conflict?
If you are actually suggesting this, may we hear your argument please?
If you are suggesting something else, will you tell us what it is?
In the meantime, here are some points that you may care to consider:
(i) wanting to use your own language is not the same as "separating out".
(ii) the warring Serbs, Croats and Moslems in Bosnia all speak basically the
same language, Serbo-Croat.
(iii) in Switzerland, there are four different official languages, and the
country has had peace for hundreds of years.
(iv) the European Community has established its Bureau for Lesser-Used
Languages with the express aim of _encouraging_ the use of such
languages. (The Bureau, by the way, recognises Scots as a language
in its own right.) The EC is hardly likely - one would imagine, at
least - to act in such a way as to cause strife, either within or
between member-states.
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