The major poets of modern Scotland are a celebration of difference

READ MORE: 40 terrific Scottish poets that take us on a rich journey

In 1955, MacDiarmid published In Memoriam James Joyce, a book-length work said to be only part of an unfinished poem on an epic scale, similar to Pound’s Cantos. The central theme is the endless variety of languages in the world, the diversity of poetic and artistic expressions of human creativity, the limitations placed upon expression by political power and imperialism, and the need to balance energy and form. It is essentially a celebration of difference:

The effort of culture is towards greater differentiation

Of perceptions and desires and values and ends,

Holding them from moment to moment

In a perpetually changing but stable equilibrium...

After the Second World War, Scottish poetry shows more than ever how rich this diversity is, each of the major poets of this generation drawing strengths from their favoured places. Through and since the 1970s, pre-eminently women have been among the finest modern poets, drawing on the gains and potential made evident by earlier generations. All poets – or almost all – draw on the work of their predecessors, not to emulate but to learn. Before we come to the late twentieth and early twenty-first century poets we might pause to take account of the diversity and range of different kinds of poem that have appeared in Scotland across centuries.

Many people find poems a bit scary. Stories and novels are fine but there’s something special about poetry that can make people think it’s either pretentious – a pompous thought expressed in flowery language – or else just plain difficult. What does it mean? What’s it about? Simple questions that demand simple answers, at least to begin with.

There’s an ancient device for helping to you to get inside a poem quickly and how not to be afraid of it: SIFT. The idea is that you “sift” the poem, let its meaning drift through the mesh of your fine mind softly and carefully.

How do you do this? Follow the letters.

S stands for Subject: what’s it about? Answer the question as simply and straightforwardly as you can.

I stands for Imagery: what are the most vivid images in the poem? What are they doing? Are they attractive or repulsive or what? How do they work alongside each other? Are they comfortable together or do they rub up against each other? Do they harmonize or clash?

F stands for Form: How would you describe the form of the poem? Does it rhyme? Is there a regular rhythm in each line? Do the sounds of vowels make assonance? Do the sounds of consonants create alliteration? What does the overall structure or form contribute to the meaning of the poem?

Some key questions about the forms that poems take are: Can you identify a Sonnet? What would be a Ceremonial (court) poem, as opposed to an Occasional (social) poem or an Occasional (individual) poem? How would you describe a Lyric poem or an Epic or a Concrete poem? What sort of poem is a Satire (what might be an ironic form)? What especially characterises a Ballad or a Song? What are the special qualities of a Monologue or a Dialogue? Who is or are the personae, the characters in the poem? Who is the persona, the first person singular, the “I” in a poem (it is not always simply the person who wrote it)? Think about Narrative poems, poems that tell stories. There are various kinds of narrative poem: for example, fables or fantasies or dramatic stories with characters and tension and confrontation and resolution.

T stands for Tone: What is the tone of voice in the poem? Who is speaking and who is being addressed? What sort of tone of voice is suggested by the language of the poem? What tone is conveyed by the form? Is the tone in tune with the subject or does it grate against it? How is tone of voice related to the imagery in the poem?

If you start asking any of these questions about any of the poems listed here, you begin to open them up and open your own mind to them. But you should always remember that a poem works through the movement of the words in it. The language of a poem is moving. To understand a poem you need to listen to it. Read it out loud. Repeat it in your head. Memorise it. You could memorise any of the poems below and enjoy them, think about them, just to yourself wherever and whenever you want to. Or quote them to people who might care to hear them.

THERE are a few other questions you might consider. How do these poems represent places in Scotland, the languages of Scotland, women and men, what we might describe as major themes in Scottish literature? How do they connect to the historical trajectory of Scotland, to specific political or historical events? Where do they belong in terms of particular traditions (in their different languages, Gaelic, Scots and English)? What is their relationship with other major international movements? Do they show characteristic aspects of Medieval Literature, Romanticism or Modernism? How do they connect with the other arts of their time? For example, music (with reference to William Dunbar and his contemporary the composer Robert Carver, or to the Ballads, or to particular song-settings)? Or paintings, sculpture, architecture or film?

We talked earlier in these columns about major themes in Scottish literature but there are major themes in all the literatures of the world that come up again and again. You’ll find them here too. I’m thinking of the themes of Love, Death, War, the Journey, the Quest, Satire, Celebration, Praise, Lament, Cursing and Condemnation, Leavetaking on Departure, Welcome on Arrival, the Dance, Marriage, Nature, the Country and the City, Exile, Homecoming.

Ask yourself as you browse through the poems, can they help? How useful are they? If you think you might find them useful, pass them on. When my oldest uncle died, I wanted immediately to read the last few pages of a poem by the Welsh writer David Jones, called “The Sleeping Lord” and one by the American poet Wallace Stevens, called “Waving Adieu, Adieu, Adieu”. Now I think of MacDiarmid’s version of a poem from the German poet Stefan George, “You Know Not Who I Am …” which is about spirit – that which animates matter – something essential that cannot be defined or captured. “Spirit” may be a contentious word but less so when it’s plural. When I read Norman MacCaig’s poems, I know I can rely on any one of them to – let’s say, literally – lift my spirits.

Which brings us to the modern scene, and we’ll start on that

next week.