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Document : 525
Title : Craiters: 01 - Introduction
Author(s): Alexander Fenton

Text

These writings began in 1987, when I offered ‘Kipper't’ to ‘New
Writing Scotland’, as an exercise in the use of my own dialect, which is
that of Auchterless in Aberdeenshire. The aim was to tell a 'horror' story
- which had no basis in reality - as a vehicle for an accurate reflection
of the ways of speech with which I had been brought up, in their setting of
time and place, and I suspect that I also did it as a challenge to myself
to see if it would be accepted. It was. It was followed up by a second in
NWS in 1989, and by three more in the Aberdeen University Review. Its
Editor, Ian Olson, has been persistent in encouraging me to go further, to
produce a 'slim volume', and this is the outcome. His punishment is that he
has been asked to provide a Foreword.

The pieces have been written at odd moments over a number of years. The NWS
contributions were Christmas break exercises. ‘E Widdie’ was put
together one free evening in Altona at the mouth of the River Elbe, when I
happened to have a blank notebook in my bag. Eight of them were written at
Krieglach in Austria in 1995, in the evenings or by day in the shadow of
the pine forests that gave protection from the heat of a fierce sun, in the
region of Steiermark that the prolific nineteenth to early twentieth
century writer Peter Rosegger has made famous. Rosegger, the son of a
woodland farmer, portrayed the everyday life of his 'Waldheimat' in a long
series of graphic volumes, and it is easy to feel how the area favours
writing. One or two of my pieces were actually written at Annenruhe, one of
Rosegger's favourite vantage points overlooking the town of Krieglach, and
the place where he got the inspiration for one of his books. The peace of
the place undoubtedly allowed full scope to recollection in tranquillity.

I have written in the language of Auchterless as I know it because I find
it comfortable to use for the subject matter. It is the language I was
brought up to speak, and I make no apology for it. If something is worth
writing, it is worth writing in any language. I have, however, developed a
form of spelling that reflects as faithfully as possible – without
setting up obtrusive mechanisms - the sounds and cadences of the dialect.
Some of my previously published pieces were littered with unnecessary
apostrophes and have been rewritten so that this whole collection has a
consistent form of presentation which may, if anyone wants it, serve as a
pattern for future writing in the Northeast dialects.

It is much more easy to read than it looks. It is a matter of reading it,
as it were, aloud, and it will come quickly. Because good dictionaries are
available, it has not been thought necessary to provide a glossary. Keith
Williamson's Note on Language, Spelling and Pronunciation should, however,
be read first by those not familiar with the dialect, in order to get a
grasp of the conventions used to express its characteristics.

I am writing too in the firm belief that Scotland’s dialects, in spite of
the levelling influences that are everywhere, remain extremely rich and are
well capable of serving as vehicles of literary expression. The Northeast
and the Northern Isles of Scotland have an active and fruitful tradition of
using their forms of speech purposefully and creatively, but other areas
are not necessarily far behind. I am thinking, for example, of the
excellent literary quality of the Lanarkshire dialect material in Robert
McLellan's ‘Linmill Stories’. Writing by native dialect speakers with a
real insight into the history and environment and place in the world of
their own dialect areas is greatly to be encouraged.

A good dialect is something to be proud of. As the 'standard' language
becomes ever more stereotyped, through its use in performing media
functions of a generalising nature, its creative powers run the risk of
being reduced at the same time. Dialectal speech and literature may yet
turn out to be a powerful resource from which the standard language can
continually refresh itself, rather than being something that the standard
language is constantly levelling out and eroding. 'English' is in reality a
massive amalgam of innumerable forms of speech, and it should, therefore,
have a built-in capacity for self-recreation, though it may be that
reminders have to be given from time to time.

I have another reason for writing in the way I do. This is quite simply
that I was becoming tired of what may be described as the Lewis Grassic
Gibbon tradition. He came from the parish of Auchterless, too. ‘A Scots
Quair’ is a masterly composition in terms of language, for though it can
be read more or less easily by the English-speaking world in general,
nevertheless for those who come from his area, it can be read almost as if
it were written in the pure dialect, with all the correct rhythms and
cadences. The problem lies not with him, however, but with a number of
followers, who have adopted several characteristics of his style and
outlook, and have been doing them to death. They are apt, then, to become
the canon. So I have wanted to get back to natural, unforced forms of
speech, perhaps more like the way William Alexander wrote for his period. I
have found them perfectly capable of expressing anything I wanted. They
also represent the language as it is a century later than ‘Johnny Gibb of
Gushetneuk’, changed certainly but not so much changed, though change is
undoubtedly speeding up now.

Some of the pieces go into a good deal of technical detail about passing
skills and passing ways of life. When these are gone, the vocabularies that
go with them will soon vanish also, though they remain in the pages of the
Scottish National Dictionary and its offspring, The Concise Scots
Dictionary, The Pocket Scots Dictionary, and The Scots Thesaurus, as well
as in other dictionaries of Scots. I have sought, however, not only to use
the terminology that goes with, for example, fencing, stack-building and
the like, but to recreate the atmosphere that went with such activities,
and to think of the skills necessary to pursue them. This may be where the
ethnologist in me takes over, but for that also I make no apology.

All twenty items are concerned with living creatures, animals, birds or
others, in particular contexts, whether in the Northeast, in the capital
city or elsewhere. Implicit throughout, however, is the hand of humanity,
and the attitudes of fowk to craiters. The two cannot be separated, and in
at least one of the pieces, on a Slovakian village, it is human craiters
that play the leading role.

For encouragement in this enterprise, I am greatly indebted to Ian Olson,
and to others. Grateful thanks also to Keith Williamson, for taking such a
direct and practical degree of interest.

The following items have been published before, though some changes in
spelling and content have sometimes been made here:

‘Kippert’. New Writing Scotland (Association for Scottish Literary
Studies), Aberdeen 1987, 78-88.

‘Glory Hole’. New Writing Scotland (Association for Scottish Literary
Studies), Aberdeen 1989, 44-49; also in James Robertson, ed., ‘A Tongue
in Yer Heid’, Edinburgh 1994, 39-46.

‘Stirries’. Aberdeen University Review, No 180 (1988), 314-316; also in
‘Lallans’, 32 (1989), 16-18.

‘E Cheer’. Aberdeen University Review, No 189 (1993) 66-67.

‘E Black Things’. Aberdeen University Review, No 191 (1994), 285-286.

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Information about document and author:

Text
Text audience
Adults (18+): General public: Informed lay people: Specialists: Males: Females: Audience size: 1000+

Text details
Method of composition: Wordprocessed
Year of composition: 1994
Word count: 1278
General description: Introduction to collection of short stories

Text medium
Book: Periodical/journal:
Text publication details
Published: Publisher: Tuckwell Press
Publication year: 1995
Place of publication: East Linton
ISBN/ISSN: 1898410739
Edition: First
Part of larger text: Contained in: Craiters. Or Twenty Buchan Tales

Text setting
Education: Other: Putting the dialect on record, Aberdeenshire

Text type
Prose: nonfiction:

Author
Author details
Author id: 27
Forenames: Alexander
Surname: Fenton
Gender: Male
Decade of birth: 1920
Educational attainment: University
Age left school: 17
Upbringing/religious beliefs: Protestantism
Occupation: Academic/Writer/Editor
Place of birth: Shotts
Region of birth: Lanark
Birthplace CSD dialect area: Lnk
Country of birth: Scotland
Place of residence: Edinburgh
Region of residence: Edinburgh
Residence CSD dialect area: Edb
Father's occupation: Shoemaker
Father's place of birth: Aberdeen
Father's region of birth: Aberdeen
Father's birthplace CSD dialect area: Abd
Father's country of birth: Scotland
Mother's occupation: Housewife\Crofter
Mother's place of birth: Keith
Mother's region of birth: Banff
Mother's birthplace CSD dialect area: Bnf
Mother's country of birth: Scotland

Languages:
Language: English
Speak: Yes
Read: Yes
Write: Yes
Understand: Yes
Circumstances: At work
Language: Scots
Speak: Yes
Read: Yes
Write: Yes
Understand: Yes
Circumstances: At home and wherever possible