Literature and Union

Scottish Texts, British Contexts

Edited by Gerard Carruthers and Colin Kidd

An original study of ideas of union within the Scottish literary tradition from the early modern period to the present
New readings of canonical Scottish and English literature
Features some of today's leading literary scholars and historians of Britain
Re-examines historic assumptions about national identity

Literature and Union

Scottish Texts, British Contexts

Edited by Gerard Carruthers and Colin Kidd

Description

Literature and Union opens up a new front in interdisciplinary literary studies. There has been a great deal of academic work--both in the Scottish context and more broadly--on the relationship between literature and nationhood, yet almost none on the relationship between literature and unions. This volume introduces the insights of the new British history into mainstream Scottish literary scholarship. The contributors, who are from all shades of the political spectrum, will interrogate from various angles the assumption of a binary opposition between organic Scottish values and those supposedly imposed by an overbearing imperial England. Viewing Scottish literature as a clash between Scottish and English identities loses sight of the internal Scottish political and religious divisions, which, far more than issues of nationhood and union, were the primary sources of conflict in Scottish culture for most of the period of Union, until at least the early twentieth century.
The aim of the volume is to reconstruct the story of Scottish literature along lines which are more historically persuasive than those of the prevailing grand narratives in the field. The chapters fall into three groups: (1) those which highlight canonical moments in Scottish literary Unionism--John Bull, 'Rule, Britannia', Humphry Clinker, Ivanhoe and England, their England; (2) those which investigate key themes and problems, including the Unions of 1603 and 1707, Scottish Augustanism, the Burns Cult, Whig-Presbyterian and sentimental Jacobite literatures; and (3) comparative pieces on European and Anglo-Irish phenomena.

Literature and Union

Scottish Texts, British Contexts

Edited by Gerard Carruthers and Colin Kidd

1. Union and the Ironies of Displacement in Scottish Literature, Colin Kidd
2. John Bull, Sister Peg and Anglo-Scottish Relations in the Eighteenth Century, Alasdair Raffe
3. 'Bagpipes no Musick': Allan Ramsay, James Arbuckle and the significance of the 'Scots' poetic revival, Richard Holmes
4. James Thomson and 'Rule, Britannia', Ralph Mclean
5. Fictions, Libels and Unions in the long Eighteenth Century, Thomas Keymer
6. Jacobite Unionism, Gerard Carruthers
7. Inclusion and Exclusion in the British State: Walter Scott's Ivanhoe and The Fortunes of Nigel, Alison Lumsden
8. Union and Presbyterian Ulster Scots: William McComb, James McKnight, and The Repealer Repulsed, Andrew R. Holmes
9. Between Nationhood and Nonconformity: the Scottish Whig-Presbyterian Novel and the Denominational Press, Valerie Wallace and Colin Kidd
10. Contested commemoration: Robert Burns, urban Scotland and Scottish nationality in the nineteenth century, Christopher Whatley
11. Rogue Element: Charles Rogers and the Scotching of British History, Catriona Macdonald
12. Unspeakable Scots: dialogues and dialectics in Scottish / British literary culture before the First World War, David Goldie
13. Once and Future Kingdoms, Donald Mackenzie
14. A.G. MacDonell's England, their England, Brian Young
15. England's Scotland, Robert Crawford
16. Postscript: The Death of Literary Unionism, Gerard Carruthers

Literature and Union

Scottish Texts, British Contexts

Edited by Gerard Carruthers and Colin Kidd

Author Information

Gerard Carruthers, University of Glasgow,Colin Kidd, University of St Andrews

Gerard Carruthers is General Editor of the OUP Collected Works of Robert Burns, author of Scottish Literature, A Critical Guide (EUP, 2009) and Robert Burns (Northcote, 2004). He has edited a dozen essay-collections or critical editions and written many essays in literary studies. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.

Colin Kidd is Wardlaw Professor at the University of St Andrews and a Fellow of all Souls College, Oxford. He is the author of several books on the history of ethnic and national identities, including Subverting Scotland's Past (CUP, 1993), British Identities before Nationalism (1999), The Forging of Races (CUP, 2006), and Union and Unionisms (CUP, 2008). He was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 2010. His most recent book, The World of Mr Casaubon (CUP, 2016) is a study of George Eliot's deluded mythographer and his Key to All Mythologies.

Contributors:

Gerard Carruthers, University of Glasgow
Robert Crawford, University of St Andrews
David Goldie, University of Strathclyde
Andrew Holmes, Queen's University, Belfast
Richard Holmes, University of Bristol
Thomas Keymer, University of Toronto
Colin Kidd, St Andrews/All Souls College, Oxford
Alison Lumsden, University of Aberdeen
Catriona Macdonald, University of Glasgow
Donald Mackenzie, University of Glasgow
Ralph McLean, National Library of Scotland
Alasdair Raffe, University of Edinburgh
Valerie Wallace, Victoria University of Wellington in New Zealand
Christopher A Whatley, University of Dundee
Brian Young, Christ Church, Oxford

Literature and Union

Scottish Texts, British Contexts

Edited by Gerard Carruthers and Colin Kidd

Reviews and Awards

Shortlisted for the Saltire Society Scottish Research Book of the Year Award, supported by the National Library of Scotland |k Y

"A landmark collection: it raises significant questions to which no single volume could offer definitive answers; the editors' attempt to set a new agenda for Scottish literary research is to be welcomed." -- Alex Thomson, University of Edinburgh

"A significant intervention in Scottish literary studies, and all the contributors deserve commentation." --Stuart Kelly, The Scotsman