Shetland Literature
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Shetland Literature
Shetland literature is literature written in Shetland, Scotland, or by writers from Shetland. The literature is often written in Shetland dialect or its parent language, Norn, and often depicts the history and folklore of Shetland. Common themes include reflections on island life and proximity to the sea, it is fishing and crofting traditions, the weather and seasons as determined by Shetland's climate, Shetland's unique landscape, its flora and fauna, and the influence of the people's Viking heritage. Folklore often displays features seen similarly in Scandinavia and some Celtic traditions. Norse literature The earlier Norse language faded slowly, taking at least three hundred years to die out in certain isolated parts of Shetland such as Foula and Unst, as first Lowland Scots and then English became the language of power. The Norn language influences the variety of Lowland Scots spoken in Shetland today, in lexicon and grammar. This unique mix has come to be called either She ...
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Shetland
Shetland, also called the Shetland Islands and formerly Zetland, is a subarctic archipelago in Scotland lying between Orkney, the Faroe Islands and Norway. It is the northernmost region of the United Kingdom. The islands lie about to the northeast of Orkney, from mainland Scotland and west of Norway. They form part of the border between the Atlantic Ocean to the west and the North Sea to the east. Their total area is ,Shetland Islands Council (2012) p. 4 and the population totalled 22,920 in 2019. The islands comprise the Shetland (Scottish Parliament constituency), Shetland constituency of the Scottish Parliament. The local authority, the Shetland Islands Council, is one of the 32 council areas of Scotland. The islands' administrative centre and only burgh is Lerwick, which has been the capital of Shetland since 1708, before which time the capital was Scalloway. The archipelago has an oceanic climate, complex geology, rugged coastline, and many low, rolling hills. The lar ...
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Lerwick
Lerwick (; non, Leirvik; nrn, Larvik) is the main town and port of the Shetland archipelago, Scotland. Shetland's only burgh, Lerwick had a population of about 7,000 residents in 2010. Centred off the north coast of the Scottish mainland and on the east coast of the Shetland Mainland, Lerwick lies north-by-northeast of Aberdeen; west of the similarly sheltered port of Bergen in Norway; and south east of Tórshavn in the Faroe Islands. One of the UK's coastal weather stations is situated there, with the local climate having small seasonal variation due to the maritime influence. Being located further north than Saint Petersburg and the three mainland Nordic capitals, Lerwick's nights in the middle of summer only get dark twilight and winters have below six hours of complete daylight. History Lerwick is a name with roots in Old Norse and its local descendant, Norn, which was spoken in Shetland until the mid-19th century. The name "Lerwick" means ''bay of clay''. The c ...
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Vagaland
Vagaland (6 March 1909 – 30 December 1973), was a Scottish poet from Shetland. Biography Born Thomas Alexander Robertson at Westerwick at the southern tip of the parish of Sandsting, his mother's home. He was the second son of Andrina Johnston and Thomas Robertson of Skeld, a merchant seaman. His father drowned before his first birthday, and his mother moved with her two sons to Stove in Waas. He grew up in hardship though his love for the land and the people overcame that. It was the old Norse name for the area that he adopted as his pen name. A shy boy who adjusted with difficulty to the rough and tumble of school, he was nonetheless able both at physical and intellectual pursuits, and in time he excelled. He took his MA at the University of Edinburgh and was offered the possibility of postgraduate work at Oxford, which he turned down for financial reasons, instead becoming a teacher at the Lerwick Central School and carer to his ailing mother. In 1953, he married Martha ...
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Robert Alan Jamieson
Robert Alan Jamieson (born 1958) is a poet and novelist from Shetland, Scotland. He grew up in the crofting community of Sandness. He works as a creative writing tutor at Edinburgh University, having been co-editor of the '' Edinburgh Review'' in 1993–1998 and a creative writing fellow at the Universities of Glasgow and Strathclyde in 1998–2001. Novels *''Soor Hearts'' (1984) *''Thin Wealth'' (1986) *''A Day at the Office'' (1991), named by Edinburgh-based List Magazine among the 100 Best Scottish Books of All Time: "Each page of this book – a precursor to much modern experimental Scottish fiction – looks more like a work of art than a novel." *''Da Happie Laand'' (2010) *''MacCloud Falls'' (2017) Poetry Jamieson writes in the Shetland dialect of Scots. Some of his works are: *''Shoormal'' (1986) *''Nort Atlantik Drift'' (1999), reprinted in a bilingual edition in 2007. Includes "Laamint fir da tristie", which was selected as a poem of the week at ''The Scotsman'' in ...
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Lollie Graham
Laurence I. "Lollie" Graham (1924–2008) was a Scottish poet and author Born in Stromfirth, Shetland, in 1924. The Graham family moved to one of the new croft holdings at Veensgarth, Tingwall, Shetland, Tingwall and Graham lived there until he died. He had been a part-time crofter most of his life, and active in local politics. After World War II, Graham studied at the University of Edinburgh and Moray House College, Edinburgh, during which time he was active in literary circles and co-edited a volume of Scottish student verse. He returned to Shetland to take up a teaching post and taught at the Anderson Educational Institute and the Scalloway Junior High School. He was also headmaster at Urafirth Primary School and latterly the long-term and much loved headmaster of Gott, Shetland, Gott Primary School. He contributed biographical sketches to the important textbook ''The Shetland Book'' (1967), edited by Andrew T. Cluness. Graham provided an introduction and a commentary to '' ...
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Christine De Luca
Christine De Luca (born 4 April 1947) is a Scottish poet and writer from Shetland, who writes in both English and Shetland dialect. Her poetry has been translated into many languages. She was appointed Edinburgh's Makar, or poet laureate from 2014 to 2017. De Luca is a global advocate for the Shetland dialect and literature of the Northern Isles of Scotland. Early life and education De Luca was born Christine Pearson in Walls, Shetland. Her father, Sandy Pearson, was the headmaster of Happyhansel Junior Secondary School in Shetland. De Luca moved to Edinburgh in her late teens to study at University of Edinburgh. After graduation, she taught high school for several years and later obtained a Masters in Educational Research in 1980. Writing career De Luca's first three poetry collections were published by the Shetland Library. Her first collection, ''Voes and Sounds'' was published in 1994 and her second work, ''Wast Wi Da Valkyries'', was published in 1997. Both collections wo ...
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Rhoda Bulter
Rhoda Bulter (15 July 1929 – 1994), Shetland author, is one of the best-known Shetland poets of recent times. Biography Born Rhoda Jernetta Ann Johnson, in Lerwick, she was the daughter of Jeremiah Johnson, seaman, from West Houlland in the parish of Walls, and Barbara Huano Thomason, from Da Horn, Lower Skelberry, Lunnasting Vidlin (from Old Norse: ''Vaðill'' meaning a ford) is a small village located on Mainland, Shetland, Scotland. The settlement is within the parish of Nesting. History It is at the head of Vidlin Voe, and is the modern heart of the old parish .... In January 1949 she married Dennis Bulter, 'Met man' from Lerwick Observatory. Poetry Her first poem, 'Fladdabister', was published in The New Shetlander in 1970, following which she became a prolific writer in the Shetland dialect. For various reasons, her literary legacy is as yet uncollected. Four slim volumes of verse were published in her lifetime – ''Shaela'', ''A Nev Foo a Coarn'' (subsequ ...
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Hugh MacDiarmid
Christopher Murray Grieve (11 August 1892 – 9 September 1978), best known by his pen name Hugh MacDiarmid (), was a Scottish poet, journalist, essayist and political figure. He is considered one of the principal forces behind the Scottish Renaissance and has had a lasting impact on Scottish culture and politics. He was a founding member of the National Party of Scotland in 1928 but left in 1933 due to his Marxist–Leninist views. He joined the Communist Party the following year only to be expelled in 1938 for his nationalist sympathies. He would subsequently stand as a parliamentary candidate for both the Scottish National Party (1945) and British Communist Party (1964). Grieve's earliest work, including ''Annals of the Five Senses'', was written in English, but he is best known for his use of "synthetic Scots", a literary version of the Scots language that he himself developed. From the early 1930s onwards MacDiarmid made greater use of English, sometimes a "synthetic English ...
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Jakob Jakobsen
Jakob Jakobsen (22 February 1864 — 15 August 1918) was a Faroese linguist and scholar. The first Faroe Islander to earn a doctoral degree, his thesis on the Norn language of Shetland was a major contribution to its historical preservation. In addition, he was known for his contributions to the Faroese language and its literature, most notably his conflict with Venceslaus Ulricus Hammershaimb over the development of the Faroese orthography, in which he unsuccessfully advocated for the adoption of a phonetic writing system. Life Jakob Jakobsen's parents were Hans Nicolai Jacobsen from Tórshavn, and Johanne Marie Hansdatter from Sandoy. Jakob was the youngest of three children, having two older sisters. Their father, H. N. Jacobsen, earned his living as a bookbinder and also ran a bookshop in Tórshavn. The original bookshop was in the old town, but H. N. Jacobsen moved the shop in 1918, to a central location further uptown, where it still stands today, retaining its traditio ...
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Basil R Anderson
Basil (, ; ''Ocimum basilicum'' , also called great basil, is a culinary herb of the family Lamiaceae (mints). It is a tender plant, and is used in cuisines worldwide. In Western cuisine, the generic term "basil" refers to the variety also known as sweet basil or Genovese basil. Basil is native to tropical regions from Central Africa to Southeast Asia. In temperate climates basil is treated as an annual plant, however, basil can be grown as a short-lived perennial or biennial in warmer horticultural zones with tropical or Mediterranean climates. There are many varieties of basil including sweet basil, Thai basil (''O. basilicum'' var. ''thyrsiflora''), and Mrs. Burns' Lemon (''O. basilicum var. citriodora''). ''O. basilicum'' can cross-pollinate with other species of the ''Ocimum'' genus, producing hybrids such as lemon basil (''O. × citriodorum'') and African blue basil (''O. × kilimandscharicum''). Etymology The name "basil" comes from the Latin , and the Greek (), m ...
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George Stewart (author)
George Stewart may refer to: *George Stewart, 9th Seigneur d'Aubigny (1618–1642), Scottish nobleman and Royalist commander in the English Civil War * George Stewart (surgeon) (1752–1813), president of the Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland *George Stewart, 8th Earl of Galloway (1768–1834), British naval commander and politician * George Stewart (VC) (1831–1868), Scottish recipient of the Victoria Cross *George Vesey Stewart (1832–1920), New Zealand farmer, coloniser and local politician *G. F. Stewart (George Francis Stewart, 1851–1928), Irish land agent * George H. Stewart (1858–1914), Associate Justice of the Idaho Supreme Court * George Neil Stewart (1860–1930), Scottish-Canadian doctor * George A. Stewart (1862–1894), head coach of the Harvard University football program * George Wilson Stewart (1862–1937), American architect * George E. Stewart (1872–1946), Philippine-American War Medal of Honor recipient * George Craig Stewart (1879–1940), bishop of th ...
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James Stout Angus
James Stout Angus (20 September 1830 – 26 December 1923) was a writer from Shetland, Scotland. Life Angus was born at Catfirth Haa in the parish of Nesting. His grandfather William Angus is recorded first at Burraness in Delting, but the lands of Catfirth were leased in 1782 to the Angus family who retained them until 1890. His son Hercules (1791–1871) married Janet Stout of Scatsta. He was a merchant at Catfirth and it was here that the writer grew up. James had some tuition from Robert Laing, schoolmaster, land surveyor and teacher of navigation, and he assisted his schoolmaster uncle in Reawick for a time, but he subsequently bound himself as a housewright or joiner, then worked as a ship's carpenter, sailing emigrant and East Indian ships. He settled in Lerwick when he married, establishing a successful business as a housewright at No. 6 Commercial Street. Angus began to publish poetry in the press in the 1870s, and is credited by Laurence Graham as having composed, in â ...
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