Scottish Culture: Dialogue and Self-Expression ed. by Aniela Korzeniowska and Izabela Szymañska (review)

Scottish Culture: Dialogue and Self-Expression, edited by Aniela Korzeniowska and Izabela Szymañska, and published under Wydawnictwo Naukowe brings together a range of highly perceptive essays on a wide scope of topics that approach the subject of Scottish culture, particularly as it is produced through various dialogues with European cultures, and those further afield. This collection continues the project that was begun by the collections Scotland in Europe / Europe in Scotland: Links – Dialogues – Analogies and Facets of Scottish Identity, both edited by Korzeniowska and Szymañska and published in 2013. These publications also took the form of a collection of essays that brought together scholars from across Europe in order to explore Scotland’s links with European cultures and vice-versa. This approach has facilitated a large and growing scholarship across the three collections that represents and explores the multi-faceted nature of Scottish culture and Scottish identity both in its development and in its expression. Scottish Culture: Dialogue and Self-Expression extends the scope of the previous collections further as it includes essays that reach beyond Europe in their content, such as Katarzyra Pisarska’s examination of Scottish-New Zealander John Macmillan Brown’s Riallaro: The Archipelago of Exiles. The collection also provides increased focus on Scotland’s relationship with the rest of the UK, as it dedicates one of its parts entirely to essays on the timely topic of the 2014 Scottish independence referendum.

Essays are arranged under six parts, which move the reader through the collection thematically, from focus on translations and inter-cultural dialogues to analyses of identity, heritage, and language, to the political backdrop of Scotland’s first independence referendum, and finally to a series of essays that explore Scottish stereotypes as they are formed via the representation of Scotland from within popular culture. The scope of the collection encompasses a wide range of periods from the Renaissance to the twenty-first century. Magdalena Charzyñska-Wojak’s focus on the Scottish Psalter provides insight into the broad cultural influences upon Scotland in the context of Renaissance Europe. Meanwhile Monika Kocot and Jerzy Jarniewicz’s provide separate analyses of the interaction between verbal and visual culture in Edwin Morgan’s poetry. Literary essays also extend to Susanna Hagemann’s examination of two German translations of Walter Scott’s Rob Roy (1817) and further include Aniela Korzeniowska’s astute and insightful exploration of Irvine Welsh’s writing as it moves across languages and cultures through her analysis of Polish translations of Glue (2001). These analyses are also not limited solely to Scottish writers; J. Derrick McClure provides fascinating analysis of the perceptions of Scottish culture through various reinterpretations of Shakespeare’s ‘Scottish play’ Macbeth. This large periodical scope is one of the strengths of the collection as it provides a developed and insightful body of work underpinned by the cultural dialogues and interactions that have shaped both Scottish and European cultures, allowing for a thoroughly cosmopolitan and outward-looking approach to Scottish culture.

Furthermore, the welcome inclusion of several essays on Orkney as well as those that focus on Gaelic language in poetry and prose reflects the heterogeneity of Scottish culture. Monika Liro explores the Orcadian heritage of four Scottish writers while Petra Johana Poncarova and Mark Ó Fionnáin each examine the use of Gaelic in Derick Thomson’s poetry and Tim Armstrong’s Cuan Dubh Drilseach respectively. These essays, combined with the collection’s various examinations of Scotland in cross-cultural dialogue, provides an invaluable source for researchers aiming to explore Scottish culture while bypassing the pretence that ‘Scottishness’ or Scottish culture are or have ever been stable and homogeneous.

The collection is also not exclusively literary in its analysis; essays on economics, politics, drama, popular culture, and television allow for a truly interdisciplinary scholarship. The organisation of these essays into parts thematically, rather than by period or methodology, proves a fruitful decision as often surprising dialogues...