Historicising Robert Burns’s Jamaica, 1786–1834
Stephen Mullen & Craig Lamont, 𝘉𝘶𝘳𝘯𝘴 𝘊𝘩𝘳𝘰𝘯𝘪𝘤𝘭𝘦 135/1 (2026)
Re-evaluating Burns’s connections with Jamaica, 1786–1834, & establishing a model with implications for how Burns and Caribbean slavery is interpreted in civic Scotland
Free via Open Access
https://www.euppublishing.com/doi/10.3366/burns.2026.0157
#Scottish #literature #history #18thcentury #RobertBurns #slavery #Jamaica #Caribbean #CaribbeanSlavery #transatlanticSlaveTrade
30 September is International Translation Day!
THE BOTTLE IMP: Scottish literature & translation
🇩🇪SUNSET SONG in the GDR
🇮🇹THE BLACK ARROW on Italian TV
🏆Scotland’s Nobel-nominated Esperanto poet
🇫🇷Franco-Scots poetry & postcolonialism
🏗️Transcreating concrete poetry
https://www.thebottleimp.org.uk/2019/12/bad-harsk-speech-and-lewit-barbar-tung/
#Scottish #literature #translation #InternationalTranslationDay #Germany #German #GDR #Italy #Italian #Esperanto #France #French #postcolonialism #ConcretePoetry
“Somehow hearing the play in Scots gave Anglophone audiences an insight into Tremblay that had hitherto eluded them”
—Mark Fisher on MICHEL TREMBLAY: PLAYS IN SCOTS – 8 Scots translations of the Québécois playwright’s work
1/4
https://www.critical-stages.org/29/michel-tremblay-plays-in-scots-two-vols/
#Scottish #literature #Scots #Scotslanguage #drama #theatre #Quebec #Tremblay #translation #InternationalTranslationDay
“The use of Scots, apart from the relative ease of working up the right atmosphere, also helps (though dangerously) because of the verbal freedom it confers on a harassed translator”
—Edwin Morgan on translating Mayakovsky, in EDWIN MORGAN: In Touch With Language. A New Prose Collection 1950–2005 (ASL, 2020)
1/3
https://asls.org.uk/publications/books/volumes/edwin-morgan-in-touch-with-language/
#Scottish #literature #poetry #translation #InternationalTranslationDay #Scots #Scotslanguage #Russian #EdwinMorgan #Mayakovsky
Faar’s Baabie Jeanie’s loon? The aal wife hersel
Stans treeshin hame the milkers at the ley park yett.
Faa caas the mornin cairt an fordals neeps an strae,
Wi waages up an risin an fee’d folk sae ull to get?…
—“War: 1939–1945” by Flora Garry (1900–2000)—born #OTD, 30 September
published in FROM THE LINE: Scottish War Poetry 1914–1945
1/2
https://asls.org.uk/publications/books/volumes/from_the_line/
#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #Scots #Scotslanguage #20thcentury #warpoetry #WW2 #womenwriters
Professor John Corbett discusses Edwin Morgan’s translation of Rostand’s CYRANO DE BERGERAC – from our 2021 Schools Conference
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0lp5t85x2g
#Scottish #literature #EdwinMorgan #InternationalTranslationDay #drama #theatre #translation #Rostand #EdmondRostand #Cyrano
“Publishable?” Perhaps she’ll advise him where to sell
Over a bottle of home-made later? Oh shit. She can tell
This is going to be The Gig From Hell…
—Liz Lochhead, “Hell for Poets”
published in A Handsel: New & Collected Poems (Polygon, 2023)
Exhibition: A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle
6 Nov–6 Dec, Scottish Storytelling centre, Edinburgh – free
Painter Alexander Moffat marks the centenary of Hugh MacDiarmid’s epic poem A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle – a landmark of modern Scottish literature
https://scottishstorytellingcentre.online.red61.co.uk/event/913:6850/913:30634/
#Scottish #literature #art #visualart #painting #exhibition #HughMacDiarmid #MacDiarmid #poem #poetry #modernism
To have got so far, alone
Almost to the seventieth stone
Is a wonder…
—George Mackay Brown, “One Star in the West”
published in Following A Lark (John Murray, 1996)
Happy National Poetry Day! The theme for 2026 is “Wonder”
#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #NationalPoetryDay #GeorgeMackayBrown #wonder
For National Poetry Day, the Scottish Poetry Library brings us six short poetry films by contemporary writers, all of whom have been part of Scotland’s Next Generation Young Makars programme.
Made to be watched on your phone, on your break or on your way somewhere, they offer poems in Gaelic & English on this year’s theme of “wonder”.
https://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/national-poetry-day-2026-wonder/
#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #NationalPoetryDay #wonder #filmpoem #Gaidhlig #Gaelic
My boy is painting outer space,
and steadies his brush-tip to trace
the comets, planets, moon and sun
and all the circuitry they run…
—Don Paterson, “The Circle”
published in RAIN (Faber, 2009)
https://www.faber.co.uk/product/9780571268580-rain/
#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #NationalPoetryDay #wonder
When I found I’d lost you –
not beside me, nor ahead,
nor right nor left not
your green jacket moving
between the trees anywhere –
I waited a long while
before wandering on…
—Kathleen Jamie, “Glamourie”
published in SELECTED POEMS (Picador, 2018)
https://www.panmacmillan.com/authors/kathleen-jamie/selected-poems/9781509882953
#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #NationalPoetryDay #wonder
Fog shroud
and clouds
(when the clock
chimed late
in the heavy
November night-
time) lifting
the mystery
for a greater
drifted
off a whole
white full
moon pitched
above the white
thin chimney-
stalk of the
new Dawsholm
incinerator…
—Edwin Morgan, “Guy Fawkes Moon”
published in COLLECTED POEMS (Carcanet, 1990)
https://www.carcanet.co.uk/9781857541885/collected-poems/
#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #EdwinMorgan #5thNovember #BonfireNight #GuyFawkes #GuyFawkesNight #RememberRemember
would thi prisoner
in thi bar
please stand
fur thi aforesaid crime
uv writn anuthir poem
awarded the certificate of safety
by thi scottish education department …
—Tom Leonard
from GHOSTIE MEN, in INTIMATE VOICES: Selected Work 1965–1983 (Etruscan Books, 2003)
#Scottish #literature #TomLeonard #poem #poetry #NationalPoetryDay
I miss thaim. Miss their quait
haans restin lowssed
oan dusty overalls
deen wi the day’s wark,
wachty buits ackwart
in their sklaik o glaur
or pentit spleiter…
—Sheila Templeton, “Workin Men”
published in 𝘛𝘢𝘭𝘬𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘈𝘣𝘰𝘶𝘵 𝘓𝘰𝘣𝘴𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘴: New Writing Scotland 34 (ASL, 2016)
Push The Boat Out – Edinburgh’s International Poetry Festival
12–15 November + pre-festival events
The programme for the 2026 PUSH THE BOAT OUT poetry festival is now online – from poetry as protest & social justice to workshops, new writers, experimental performance, music, conversations & collaborations
Rising in November in these days of dusk
I am one life older, watching now as the walls
green over, the stones break into bud;
if this is ebb-tide turned to flood it means that
nightfall might begin again at dawn…
—Robin Robertson, “Crossing the Archipelago”
published in SAILING THE FOREST (Picador, 2014)
https://www.panmacmillan.com/authors/robin-robertson/sailing-the-forest/9781447231554
Liz Lochhead’s MARY QUEEN OF SCOTS GOT HER HEAD CHOPPED OFF
13 Feb–6 Mar 2027
Citizens Theatre, Glasgow
Heaving with theatricality & gallus wit, Mary Queen of Scots Got Her Head Chopped Off weaves political relevance with fairytale storytelling. 40 years since it first premiered, this major new production brings the Scottish classic to a new generation of audiences.
https://citz.co.uk/whats-on/mary-queen-of-scots-got-her-head-chopped-off/
#Scottish #literature #drama #theatre #CitizensTheatre #Glasgow #WomenWriters #Scots #Scotslanguage
Hamish Henderson Memorial Lecture
14 November, Scottish Storytelling Centre, Edinburgh. Free
Dr Stephanie Smith, former Archives Director at the Smithsonian Center for Folklife & Cultural Heritage in Washington DC, recalls a lifetime of learning from & alongside Hamish Henderson, & reflects on his impact across her life & career.
https://scottishstorytellingcentre.online.red61.co.uk/event/913:6916/913:30818/
#Scottish #literature #culture #folklore #folklife #HamishHenderson
The mighty Mavors, jealous to behold
A Mars more mighty nor himself below,
Did once resolve his rivall to ore’throw…
—Sir Robert Ayton (1569–1638), “Upon the 5th of November”
published in JACOBEAN PARNASSUS: Scottish Poetry from the Reign of James I (ASL, 2022)
https://asls.org.uk/publications/books/volumes/jacobean-parnassus/
#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #Jacobean #17thcentury #JamesI #BonfireNight #5November #GuyFawkes #GuyFawkesNight
We were turning that too heavy earth too long,
Too long and at the wrong time –
Days of rain had made a world of clay that clung
To our spades, gripped like misery…
—Wayne Price, “Allotment”
from The Flight of the Turtle: New Writing Scotland 29 (ASL, 2011)
Women of the Saltire Society
20 October, National Library of Scotland, Edinburgh. Free, ticketed
Join the Saltire Society for a special event celebrating the women whose contributions have helped shape the Saltire Society & Scotland’s cultural life
The event will also offer a unique opportunity to view archival material especially on display for the day, & to visit the Saltire Society’s 90th anniversary exhibition
Darkland Tales: Crafting Scottish Fiction from Historical Fact
10 December, Edinburgh, & online. Free.
Join acclaimed writers from Polygon’s Darkland Tales series for a thought-provoking panel discussion on historical reimagining. Speakers include award-winning novelists Val McDermid & Graeme Macrae Burnet, Geographer Royal for Scotland Jo Sharp, & writer & broadcaster Jamie Crawford.
Hugh Miller: the David Attenborough of his day
4 December, Elgin Museum. £6.13
A fossil hunter, folklorist, man of faith, stonemason, geologist, editor, writer & social justice campaigner, find out why Hugh Miller is one of the great Scots of the 19th century – & why he deserves the title of “the David Attenborough of his day”
https://www.eventbrite.com/e/hugh-miller-the-david-attenborough-of-his-day-tickets-2004167394628
#Scottish #literature #19thcentury #Victorian #geology #folklore #science #fossil #HughMiller
Writers Speak: Douglas Stuart in conversation with Charlie Tyson
Recorded on 6 October at Harvard University: Douglas Stuart reads from & discusses his latest novel, 𝘑𝘰𝘩𝘯 𝘰𝘧 𝘑𝘰𝘩𝘯
![2: A note to the translation of Mayakovsky’s ‘Fiddle-Ma-Fidgin’
In the triptych by Hieronymus Bosch known as The Garden of Earthly Delights, the ‘Hell’ panel shows a man crucified on a harp, with the strings passing through his body, but his arms free, embracing it, in an extraordinary image of mingled pain, beauty, and yearning. In the same picture, this man is surrounded by much more grotesque images, where figures of desperation are doing things to and with various musical instruments
Which even to name wad be unlawfu’.
The poetry of Mayakovsky from his futurist period shows a similar conjunction of extreme yearning and coarsely grotesque asseverations, held together in a web of convincing fantasy where animate and inanimate react on one another. In the present poem (actual title The Violin and a Little Nervously, date 1914), written when Mayakovsky was twenty, the poet expresses in miniature the situation of his whole life: loneliness, desire to communicate and ‘contribute’, sympathy towards the outcast and the misunderstood. The potential desperation in this, however, finds voice through fantasy, fun, and caricature. A violin (the word is feminine in Russian) begins to ‘sing’ in such a personal and yearning way that the other instruments in the orchestra get annoyed with it and tell it to shut up until it can control itself; the poet bursts in on the orchestra and despite their ribald laughter embraces the […]](/proxy/post_attachment/1192233/6118b8cd1e6fd144f7283abe21d92a55.webp "2: A note to the translation of Mayakovsky’s ‘Fiddle-Ma-Fidgin’
In the triptych by Hieronymus Bosch known as The Garden of Earthly Delights, the ‘Hell’ panel shows a man crucified on a harp, with the strings passing through his body, but his arms free, embracing it, in an extraordinary image of mingled pain, beauty, and yearning. In the same picture, this man is surrounded by much more grotesque images, where figures of desperation are doing things to and with various musical instruments
Which even to name wad be unlawfu’.
The poetry of Mayakovsky from his futurist period shows a similar conjunction of extreme yearning and coarsely grotesque asseverations, held together in a web of convincing fantasy where animate and inanimate react on one another. In the present poem (actual title The Violin and a Little Nervously, date 1914), written when Mayakovsky was twenty, the poet expresses in miniature the situation of his whole life: loneliness, desire to communicate and ‘contribute’, sympathy towards the outcast and the misunderstood. The potential desperation in this, however, finds voice through fantasy, fun, and caricature. A violin (the word is feminine in Russian) begins to ‘sing’ in such a personal and yearning way that the other instruments in the orchestra get annoyed with it and tell it to shut up until it can control itself; the poet bursts in on the orchestra and despite their ribald laughter embraces the […]")
![[…] violin and proposes to this ‘wooden bride’, which he sees as a kindred soul.
I wanted in my translation to bring out if I could the distinctive Mayakovskian mixture of grotesque high-jinks and underlying seriousness of purpose. To do this, I used Scots, trying to tap an enduring Scottish tradition of grotesque exaggeration or fantasy which is found in Dunbar and the ballads, Burns and MacDiarmid.
They’ll turn me in your arms, lady,
Into an esk and adder;
But haud me fast, and fear me not,
I am your bairn’s father.
The use of Scots, apart from the relative ease of working up the right atmosphere, also helps (though dangerously) because of the verbal freedom it confers on a harassed translator. What can only be weakly called ‘expressive’ words tumble from the Caledonian cornucopia: slunkert, daunert, glinkit, sprachlt, crunkelt, yowp and yowl, for which ‘slunk’, ‘wandered’, ‘glanced’, ‘sprawled’, ‘folded’, ‘bawl and howl’ are unimpressive equivalents. The temptation in this is to make the poem look more continuously vivid or ‘strange’ than it really is. Fortunately it is difficult to make Mayakovsky look over-vivid, as his diction employs every liberty the genius of Russian allows, but the method would work only with poets who were similarly inventive and uninhibited in their linguistic texture. I don’t look on Scots as a medium that can now be widely or thoughtlessly used in poetry, but against the argument that we have reached the stage where it should be given up altogether I would offer the evidence of my own experience in translating Mayakovsky (and add to it Sydney Goodsir Smith’s Scottish version of Blok’s The Twelve): Scots gets closer than English to the ‘barbarian lyre’ of the revolutionary spirit. If people can be persuaded to read it, it will give them a sensation they cannot at the moment get from English verse.
The Review 1, April/May 1962.](/proxy/post_attachment/1192234/866d8e79d5340b464765a4d23c1132e9.webp "[…] violin and proposes to this ‘wooden bride’, which he sees as a kindred soul.
I wanted in my translation to bring out if I could the distinctive Mayakovskian mixture of grotesque high-jinks and underlying seriousness of purpose. To do this, I used Scots, trying to tap an enduring Scottish tradition of grotesque exaggeration or fantasy which is found in Dunbar and the ballads, Burns and MacDiarmid.
They’ll turn me in your arms, lady,
Into an esk and adder;
But haud me fast, and fear me not,
I am your bairn’s father.
The use of Scots, apart from the relative ease of working up the right atmosphere, also helps (though dangerously) because of the verbal freedom it confers on a harassed translator. What can only be weakly called ‘expressive’ words tumble from the Caledonian cornucopia: slunkert, daunert, glinkit, sprachlt, crunkelt, yowp and yowl, for which ‘slunk’, ‘wandered’, ‘glanced’, ‘sprawled’, ‘folded’, ‘bawl and howl’ are unimpressive equivalents. The temptation in this is to make the poem look more continuously vivid or ‘strange’ than it really is. Fortunately it is difficult to make Mayakovsky look over-vivid, as his diction employs every liberty the genius of Russian allows, but the method would work only with poets who were similarly inventive and uninhibited in their linguistic texture. I don’t look on Scots as a medium that can now be widely or thoughtlessly used in poetry, but against the argument that we have reached the stage where it should be given up altogether I would offer the evidence of my own experience in translating Mayakovsky (and add to it Sydney Goodsir Smith’s Scottish version of Blok’s The Twelve): Scots gets closer than English to the ‘barbarian lyre’ of the revolutionary spirit. If people can be persuaded to read it, it will give them a sensation they cannot at the moment get from English verse.
The Review 1, April/May 1962.")
