A CRITICAL HISTORY AND ANALYSIS OF (SCOTTISH) GAELIC FICTION

My aim in applying for research leave is to allow me to complete a study of the prose fiction of Gaelic Scotland. I began this project in 2007, having done some preliminary work in the area from 2003 onwards. The main outcome of the project will be a single-authored book, to be published by Edinburgh University Press in 2010.\n\nThis project is the first in-depth analysis of Gaelic fiction. Literary criticism of Gaelic has always concentrated on analysing the poetry, in spite of the gradual emergence of a substantial body of very significant prose literature from the latter half of the twentieth century onwards. Even though critics have been slow to respond to this emerging trend, newer authors have been inspired by it, to the extent that the early twenty-first century has seen more novels published than the entire previous history of the language combined. This project examines both sides of this phenomenon: i.e. why prose fiction has taken so long to flourish but has suddenly burgeoned at an unprecedented rate in the past seven years; and also why critics have been reluctant to engage with it until now. The study provides a framework for understanding the prose literature that has previously been passed over by critics, but also examines the few commentaries and critical works that have been written.\n\nTo a large degree, Gaelic fiction is only around a century old. It was invented by a coterie of enthusiasts who wished to furnish the language with what they saw as a complete range of modes of literary expression. Their vision was informed by their knowledge of English literature, and their motivation was as much socio-political as it was cultural. This study considers the way a prose writing style developed, tending towards the florid, verbose and old-fashioned manners that characterised the secular prose that had begun to emerge in the nineteenth century. That nineteenth-century writing was heavily influenced by religious writing, and indeed much of it was composed or published by members of the clergy. Simultaneously, keen amateur scholars were in the process of writing down the folklore of the remaining Gaelic heartlands for the first time, in common with like-minded individuals throughout Europe, perhaps especially inspired by the Ossianic adventure. It is striking that the early fiction writers modelled their work stylistically on the religious and didactic paradigms rather than the pacy, popular, and highly-vernacular language of the folk tales. The current study examines some of the reasons for the choices that were made, and also analyses some of the corollaries of these choices.\n\nThe study will feature analyses of certain key texts, especially some of those that have received less attention than might be expected. There will also be the first critical discussion of the highly-influential periodical Gairm, which ran for fifty years and officially produced two hundred issues.\n