ONE of Scotland’s leading cultural figures has called for 2021 to be designated “Scott Year” to mark the 250th anniversary of the birth of the novelist Sir Walter Scott.
Laurie Sansom, chief executive of the National Theatre of Scotland (NTS), said the move could help spur writers, musicians, dancers and artists in the country’s national performing companies to create works inspired by the novelist.
Sansom, who is also the artistic director of NTS, made the suggestion in a submission to MSPs in which he highlighted opportunities for the arts sector over the coming years.
“Joint creative/artistic planning across the national companies to mark particular anniversaries thereby creating a themed cultural year. An example could be the 250th Anniversary of the birth of Sir Walter Scott in 2021,” wrote Sansom in his evidence to Holyrood’s education and culture committee which met yesterday.
“National companies could work in collaboration with the National Collections, Creative Scotland and the Scottish Government to designate 2021 The Scott Year and create a pioneering programme of work that re-examines Walter Scott’s legacy and contribution.”
Born in 1771, Scott is best known and commonly regarded as the founder of the historical novel, but he was also a playwright, a poet and a ballad collector. By the 1820s, his novels were widely read and internationally acclaimed.
However, over recent decades his novels have been read less and rarely feature in literature classes in schools.
Last night Lee Simpson, treasurer of the Edinburgh Sir Walter Scott Club, said the decline in Scott’s popularity may in part be due to readers finding his style of language difficult.
“The dialect he uses can be difficult and his work does sometimes require a bit of patience, but if people stay with his novels they are richly rewarded,” said Simpson.
“He is one of the world’s really great writers and I believe his work should be read by more people. He’s funny, entertaining and his novels are always gripping and dramatic.”
Simpson added: “I think it’s a great suggestion to have a Scott Year in 2021 and I hope it would help put his work back on the curriculum in Scottish schools.”
Simpson suggested the novel Kenilworth, set in 1575, which centres on the secret marriage of Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester, and Amy Robsart, daughter of Sir Hugh Robsart, as an excellent and accessible introduction to Scott’s work.
Sansom has been artistic director and chief executive of the NTS since 2013 and has explored Scots history in previous productions put on by the company.
He directed the James Plays trilogy – about James I, II and III of Scotland by Rona Munro – which premiered at the Edinburgh International Festival in 2014 and won a Herald Angel award, before transferring for a sold-out run in the Olivier Theatre, at the National Theatre in London and winning the Evening Standard Theatre award for Best Play 2014.
Later in his submission to MSPs Sansom raised concerns too on the provision of drama classes and theatre trips for school pupils – saying cut backs in these would be bad for both the NTS and for children’s education.
“Reductions in the study of performing arts in Scottish schools, and the connected reduction in schools’ ability to organise trips to performances for pupils, has a direct impact on the future of the National Theatre of Scotland,” he wrote.
“Every robust piece of evidence published in the last generation testifies to the fact that, if a person experiences the arts early in life, they are multiple percentage points more likely to consume the arts as adults.
“The increasing lack of arts education as local authorities in Scotland look to reduce expenditure on “non-essential” items, is storing up an issue for the future.
“In this future, Scotland will have bred a generation of citizens who are much less able to partake of the well-being effects, health benefits, intellectual advantage and sheer joy of the arts, since they will not have had the opportunity of exposure to culture as children.”
Sansom also raised concerns with MSPs about the impact of a 3 per cent budget cut to his company during 2016/17, warning it would lead to fewer productions that the company is able to tour across Scotland.
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