Lallans
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Lallans, a variant of the Scots word lawlands (lowlands) - the lowlands of Scotland. cf. hieland (highland) - the highlands of Scotland.
Lallans is also used to refer to the Scots language. It was used by both Robert Burns and Robert Louis Stevenson.
They took nae pains their speech to balance,
Or rules to gie;
But spak their thoughts in plain, braid lallans,
Like you or me.
- —Robert Burns in Epistle To William Simson
"What tongue does your auld bookie speak?"
He'll spier; an' I, his mou to steik :
"No bein' fit to write in Greek,
I wrote in Lallan,
Dear to my heart as the peat reek,
Auld as Tantallon.
- —Robert Louis Stevenson in "The Maker to Posterity"
The term lallans was also used during the Scottish Renaissance to refer to what Hugh MacDiarmid called synthetic Scots i.e. a synthesis integrating, blending and combining various forms of Scots both vernacular and archaeic. This was intended as a classical, standard Scots for a world-class literature although it was more often that not Scots words grafted on to a standard English grammatical structure somewhat removed from traditional spoken Scots. Its main practitioners not being habitual Scots speakers themselves.
MacDiarmid's detractors often referred to it as plastic Scots - a word play on synthetic as in synthetic plastics - to emphasize its artificiality. William Shakespeare also indulged in similar activities using the English language but has never been accused of writing synthetic or plastic English. With this in mind Sydney Goodsir Smith answered critics in his "EPISTLE TO JOHN GUTHRIE".
We've come intil a gey queer time
Whan scrievin Scots is near a crime,
'There's no one speaks like that', they fleer,
-But wha the deil spoke like King Lear?
Lallans is the name of the magazine of the Scots Language Society.
See also: Ullans
External Links
- Lallans Magazine (http://www.lallans.co.uk)