Russians in the Western Isles
Alan Titley
University College, Cork
Abstract
Although the Russians may have not been as active in rolling their tanks across countries as many other imperialist nations, they nonetheless have a presence where we least expect them. The connections between Russia and Scotland are tenuous enough, and yet a Russian presence is palpable in several contemporary Scottish Gaelic novels. Of all the modern literary forms, the Gaelic novel is the least developed, but there has been a fruitful growth in the genre in the last decade. Traditionally the Gaelic novel dealt with the awfulness of living in a tightly controlled Presbyterian community, and of the gasping for air that this entailed. Recent novels deal with the breaking up of the local community and with the intrusion of the modern world. In several instances the outsiders breaking the barriers of the local organic community have been Russians. This is particularly true in the novels Dacha Mo Ghaoil by Tormod Macgill-Eain, and Na Klondykers by Iain F. Macleoid. They are an interesting case of the invention of ‘the other’ to test the validity of the self, and an absorbing study of the meeting of fictional truth with easy stereotypes. This paper will discuss these pesky Russians interfering in the traditional way of life of so-called romantic Scotland.