Alan Breck Stewart on Education

[tree_and_leaf]

"Ye see, David man, they'll be Hieland folk. There'll be some Frasers, I'm thinking, and some of the Gregara; and I would never deny but what the both of them, and the Gregara in especial, were clever experienced persons. A man kens little till he's driven a spreagh of neat cattle (say) ten miles through a throng lowland country and the black soldiers maybe at his tail. It's there that I learned a great part of my penetration. And ye need nae tell me: it's better than war; which is the next best, however, though generally rather a bauchle of a business. Now the Gregara have had grand practice."

"No doubt that's a branch of education that was left out with me," said I.

"And I can see the marks of it upon ye constantly," said Alan. "But that's the strange thing about you folk of the college learning: ye're ignorant, and ye cannae see 't. Wae's me for my Greek and Hebrew; but, man, I ken that I dinnae ken them--there's the differ of it. Now, here's you. Ye lie on your wame a bittie in the bield of this wood, and ye tell me that ye've cuist off these Frasers and Macgregors. Why! Because I couldnae see them, says you. Ye blockhead, that's their livelihood."

... I've been re-reading 'Kidnapped' and 'Catriona', and am forcibly reminded of how much I love Alan Breck, for all his faults.

Not to mention the pithy analysis of homesickness:

" So we went east by the beach of the sea, towards where the salt-pans were smoking in by the Esk mouth. No doubt there was a by-ordinary bonny blink of morning sun on Arthur's Seat and the green Pentlands; and the pleasantness of the day appeared to set Alan among nettles.

"I feel like a gomeral," says he, "to be leaving Scotland on a day like this. It sticks in my head; I would maybe like it better to stay here and hing."

"Ay, but ye wouldnae, Alan," said I.

"No but what France is a good place too," he explained; "but it's some way no the same. It's brawer, I believe, but it's no Scotland. I like it fine when I'm there, man; yet I kind of weary for Scots divots and the Scots peat-reek." "

Comments

[parrot-knight.livejournal.com]

I read Kidnapped and Catriona about three years ago, when preparing my paper on the connections between Peter Watkins's Culloden and Doctor Who: The Highlanders. I think what sticks in my mind most is Stevenson's emphasis on contrasting the blood-feuds of Highland justice with the legal code David is used to, and Catriona's description of Gaelic as David's native tongue, which he has forgotten. Romantic Stevenson is, but he conveys belief in a Scots national identity based on reconciliation between Highland and Lowland, however simplified his depiction of the cultural Highland line. (I meant to read Scott's Waverley too, but haven't yet.)

The real Alan Breck never returned to Scotland, as far as is known; but I've read that he becomes difficult to trace among all the Scots exiles in French service.

(I don't have a Jacobite icon yet; but Prince Frederick, pictured, had lots of Jacobite friends, and Catherine Walkinshaw, Prince Charles Edward's mistress's mother, held a household appointment for Frederick well before the '45.)

[tree_and_leaf]

I think Stevenson is quite good on the differences in self-image (however it might be in reality) between Highland and Lowland - better than Scott, in some ways, although Waverly is great fun and well worth a read.

A couple of years BBC Alba did a documentary about the Appin murder, followed by a round table with historians and descendants of both the Appin Stewarts and of the Red Fox himself. It was quite amusing, but also mildly alarming, how quickly it got very personal (although I did laugh unsympathetically at the Campbell complaining about how nasty everyone is about their role post '45 - "Scotland's national sport is Campbell baiting!", he complained).

[dolabellae.livejournal.com]

A large part of my motivation for finally getting round to reading Kidnapped this year - was your use of Alan Breck & 'bonny fechter' in that amazing AU Peter/Harriet fic. I enjoyed it very much, and wish I'd made Alan's acquaintance earlier.

[tree_and_leaf]

You know, I'm rather proud of that!

Alan was the object of one of my earliest literary crushes, despite his smallpox scars. I suspect it probably used to be quite common among well-brought up Scottish girls (cf. the schoolgirl in The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie who is clearly writing Self-insert-Mary-Sue/ Alan fanfic....)

[tree_and_leaf]

Although I ought to add that I nicked the 'Bonny Fechter' quotation from Sayers canon (I think the scene in Peter's club in Gaudy Night, although there Peter applies it to himself.)