She had the eternal youth
that an inquiring
mind possesses
Judith Jaafar
Wake up, Arab world
Michael Elcock
This is just a quick note to thank SR for publishing those excerpts from JP McCondrach’s diary. The entries are remarkable, incredibly alive. My father was there in the desert as well, but in the air with the RAF. He spoke of it to me in his later years.
But the most visceral experience that was ever transmitted to me of those days came from Sorley MacLean. I was fortunate to be invited to a small celebration for Sorley’s 70th birthday at the old Scottish Arts Council offices in Charlotte Square in Edinburgh. That would have been around 1981. Sorley read us his poem Death Valley. I can still hear his beautiful voice; his unique pronunciation of the words ‘Ruweisat Ridge’:
Sitting dead in ‘Death Valley’
below the Ruweisat Ridge,
a boy with his forelock down about his cheek
and his face slate-grey
As I say it was a visceral experience; immediate and immensely powerful. It was also an extraordinarily intimate moment. Strange perhaps. Although perhaps not, because of the uniquely descriptive nature of the language in which he thought and wrote.
Scotland’s Gaelic poets are among the very finest poets anywhere in this world. They seem to draw upon something almost inexpressibly deep and abiding – something timeless and ageless; something that does not seem to be available to all but a very few of those who come from a more urban tradition. I believe that they are vastly under-recognised, particularly – and sadly – in Scotland.
The new edition of SRB includes an essay on the history of BBC Scotland by SR editor Kenneth Roy
To read it, click here
Today’s banner
Kingston Bridge, Glasgow, at dusk
Photograph by
Islay McLeod
Why I cannot
share in this year’s
poppy mania
Eric Wilson
‘Poppy power! Special armbands can inspire us to beat Spain, say proud England stars’ (Daily Mail headline, 11 November)
Eric Wilson started off in farming, worked farms here and Canada. Did a variety of other jobs: oil rigs, Granton trawlers, forestry, dock work in
Hamburg. Went to university in mid-20s to study English lit. Taught here and in Hong Kong. Currently teaching English at Tynecastle High School
Gus Skinner writes:
Tis hard this constant lack of God, though he created as many fears as he salved – if he did.
I happened to be in France on the 11th, at 11, on the 11th of the century.
Invited by friends to a village ceremony, well two really – one for a UK soldier, special forces shot behind enemy lines, and two others, resistance as it is called in Britain.
In the village, a few miles away, there was a ceremony of touching sincerity. The children, who yearly lay a cross for the British soldier, were – what can I say? They were delightful. It was delightful. In the town centre the speeches were far too long; mention of the hundred years war was not necessary. We processed, a small town, about 80 of us behind flags. And some members who had not had their full medals awarded – average age 85.
It was a personal tribute. It was lovely. It rained. I can think of nothing quite similar in Scotland, but perhaps I am wrong. The reality is that the deaths were of folk who never went near politics or power, but were killed. Would it not then be better to support them and theirs? Instead of God perhaps we might better recognise those who died in Ayrshire, in Wrexham, in Portree, even in Inverskinnerton. Certainly in Lewis.
The poppy, that I heard one at least person on the BBC say was admired jealously by others, may not be. I think not. It will certainly not export. And there are those who think: never again. That is what is happening. Thank God or reason?
France had a public holiday on the 11th. The UK will have a major strike on the 30th. Maybe there is a gap in understanding, or more likely of good communication. Honest about realities, that we are now forced into. Surely that is our future: dead or living.
