AHEAD of the release of his new film, Robert the Bruce (at cinemas nationwide from June 28), Angus Macfadyen imagines what the iconic Scottish leader would think if he woke up to today’s world of politics.
MY heart bleeds. I woke up this morning in the future. Well, my future – your unfortunate nightmare, your now.
I was woken by the most atrocious sound of voices emanating from a black monolith which compels images from inside it, as if by the darkest magic … the most unpleasant voices they were, not unlike that of the Comyn, whose throat I slit on the altar, it’s true, for uttering similar falsehoods.
These voices, this morning, they croaked a familiar sound, that of the contempt of Empire for those whose lives they casually discard with an unjust law here, dismiss with an ill-educated mockery there, or snuff out with weapons built for profit everywhere now, it seems, in this unending war on the common man – for real estate is and always has been valued more highly than the tender flesh of innocence.
My heart is bleeding – 700 years ago I laid my weary head down at last in a land that was free and proud, a land where my people shared in the common wealth, I had declared it so at Arbroath, and sent it on to that scurrilous pretender, that puppet of a Pope whom Philippe le Bel, king of France, had installed in Avignon. It was a declaration of victory over Empire.
But now I awake to find that all is undone. Your planet is close to ecological collapse. You have extinguished life systematically, you yourselves, who stand at the top of an imaginary food pyramid, live no better than the basest of creatures, because you have handed over the keys of the kingdom to a squabbling pack of hyenas who continue to hoard all the wealth and parade about in the most obscene displays of wealth whilst you watch on in envy, this black monolith, now in the palm of your hand, and you are transfixed by the shadows in your caves. Each of you alone in your cave.
And I thought I had it bad.
So now I must rise up again and call to the faithful, to those who hold still that fragile dream in their hearts, a dream suffocated like a child in its crib by the bloated malevolence of greedy warmongering charlatans in grey suits whose smiling respectability hides a foul pestilence we must banish again from this fair land. Rise up, Scotland! Your voice is strong and clear. Let’s sing a song before battle. A song by Josh Cruddas for the hearts and minds.
one more for the road
one more for the night
one more for the laughter
one more to the heights
one more for the dream
a dream that never ends
and so I go to dreaming
before I wake again
one more for the dead
who never had a chance
who saw their life was over
and bled out on the land
where does it all go
this river we run through?
what is that endless ocean
where we must all go to?
is it real or fake
another lie to hate?
or is it where our maker
unites us with our fate?
unites the clans and I
I’ll rise to seek the day
when Scotland stands for all
and all in this fair land
can call the mountains free
the rivers and the lochs
their limbs to wander over
their God given liberty
that none may own these fields,
these glens and dusty ways
are yours to call your own
for I declared it so
one day in fair Arbroath
and you can call me nuts
and names and mock the clown
but in this cave I will not die
I’ll rise to end all wars
all tyranny is over
all poverty will cease
we’ll tax the wealthy healthily
and that will be my call
so fight my young today
once more unto the breach
each life laid down is like
a stone of destiny
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