Sorley MacLean (1911–1996)

The best Gaelic poet of the 20th century, and not only in my opinion. Seamus Heaney thought so too. The best poems (Hallaig, some of the Eimhir love poems) are as good as anything written by Yeats (and I can give no higher praise). The Cuillin (English spelling) is a long poem which reminds me of Blake in its visionary content, though Blake's version of Christianity is replaced by Maclean's version of Marxism (which he later renounced). Both can be obscure and utterly magnificent, sometimes both at the same time. (Heaney again: "Blake and Marx look down with admiration"). There is a real poet at work here, at least in the original Gaelic. Maclean wrote only in Gaelic but there is an English translation on the facing page, mostly by the poet with a few by the editors. Unfortunately the poet's own translations are at times a bit disappointing because they are too word-for-word. But if like 99.9% of LibraryThing readers you don't read Gaelic, don't be put off by that: the poetry shines through quite brightly enough in English even if some the bardic voice and tone is missing. Once read, the last few stanzas of the Cuillin will never be forgotten; I have read them in public (in English) quite a few times and it never fails to move. But like most poets who write a lot, the quality is sometimes uneven and there are some poems that don't really make it. After all, Wordsworth was quite capable both of writing 'The Prelude' and the Duddon Sonnets and also perpetrating the Ecclesiastical Sonnets, but the latter have not destroyed his reputation. Like Wordsworth, Maclean can sometimes reach the parts that other poets cannot reach. Read him.… (more)

To be a great poet in one's native tongue is a rare honour, but to be a GREAT poet in two languages must be unique. I have only a vestigial grasp of Gaelic, but a few times I heard Somhairle read some of his works and could grasp why he was regarded as the greatest of Gaelic poets for over a century, if not for all time. When I found that he had translated all his works into English and had them printed en face with the originals, I had to buy them. Once I started to read the English verse I had to read the whole book, not all at once [that would have insulted its beauty], but over a week or so, sitting in sunshine in the garden of a croft with Loch Duich to my left and the Monroes of Lintail to my right.. I often read groups of these verses and usually I can put it down after a dozen pages, knowing hoe addictive it can be. Once, however, back on the shores of Loch Duich, I started on the section The Broken Image and had to spend the next 6 days reading the whole.

My slight grasp of Gaelic is enough to tell that some of the translations ar not literal, and I believe this true of most if not all of them. The translations are not just copies, but true English verse that refracts rather than reflects the originals.

Be you English or Gael, or blest as a bilingual, if you love poetry you have to read this book. Anyone who does not find that they return again and again is not a true lover of verse.

Thank you Somhairle for bringing beauty to this world that Politicians and Big Business are ruining, and thanks to Wester Ross and the Hebrides that gave Somhairle his love of beauty, and still give us a world of beauty, even if the odd nuclear submarine scares off the seals and sea-otters from the sea beside his native Raasay.… (more)