Home / Quotes / Quote by W.N. Herbert

Quote by W.N. Herbert

“When my grandmother makes a mistake, she says 'Ah tell a leh'... But I feel the same whenever I use conversational English picked up after fourteen years at Oxford. Or whenever I lapse into a full-throated Dundonian Scots at home and someone announces, 'Ye've no lost yir accent'. Herbert speak with forked tongue.”

Quote by W.N. Herbert

Book:Don't Ask Me What I Mean: Modern Poets in their Own Words

Work

Don't Ask Me What I Mean: Modern Poets in their Own Words

Browse quotes and source details for this work. more

Author

Browse famous quotes and profile details for W.N. Herbert. more

You May Also Like

“We think that mercy is a sweeter and easier thing than justice, but it is not so; for justice takes us as we are, but mercy assaults us and batters at the gates of our heart, demanding that we be made new...Sometimes sorrow is easier than joy, and despair more comforting that hope.”

Author:Anthony Esolen

“Ach!" cried Emmeline impatiently, "you had aye a saft side to Madge. Onybody wi' their twa een in their heid cud a' seen the road she was like to tak. Wi' her palaverin' an' her pooderin' an' her this an' that. She had a' her orders, had Madge. An' a stink o scent 'at wad knock ye doon. Foozlin' her face wi' pooders. Eneuch to pit faces ooten fashion. I wadna be seen ga'in' the length o' masel wi' a face like yon. A wadna ging the midden sic a sicht.”

Makeup Scent Scots Language Madge

Book:The Quarry Wood

Source: The Quarry Wood

“Some airt the linties maun be singan, Here the winds are toom, And aye the rain is dingan, dingan, Dingan on the toun.”

Author:Sydney Goodsir Smith

“Now Scots, it must be observed, is not English badly spelled; nor is it a dialect of English. To simplify, but not in a direction away from the truth; the Scots language was a development - and by now is a degeneration - of the Anglian branch of what is called Old English, and was originally spoken from the Forth to the Humber - that's to say, on both sides of the Border. The Saxon branch to the South flourished and became what we call English. With the establishment of the Border, the Anglian branch developed as Scots. Scots and English, therefore, are cousin languages with a common ancestor, and it is as absurdto call Scots a dialect of English as it would be to call English a dialect of Scots.”

Scotland English Language Scots Language Anglo Saxon England

Book:Scottish Eccentrics

Source: Scottish Eccentrics

“The language of this Poeme is (as thou seeist) mixt of the English and Scottish Dialects; which perhaps may be vnpleasant and irksome to some readers of both nations. But I hope the gentle and judicious English reader will beare with me, if I retaine some badge of mine owne countrie, by vsing sometimes words that are peculiar therevnto, especiallie when I finde them propre, and significant. And as for my owne countrymen, they may not justly finde fault with me, if for the more parte I vse the English phrase, as worthie to be preferred before our owne for the elegance and perfection thereof. Yea I am perswaded that both countrie-men will take in good part the mixture of their Dialects, the rather for that the bountiful providence of God doth invite them both to a staiter vnion and conjunction aswell in languages as in other respectes.”

English Language Scots Language Union Of The Crowns

Book:The Tragedie of Darius

Source: The Tragedie of Darius

“We may even conclude it to be an evidence of strength, rather than of weakness, that the Scots language and the Scottish literature did not maintain a separate existence. Scottish, throwing in its luck with English, has not only much greater chance of survival, but contributes important elements of strength to complete the English...”

English Language United Kingdom English Literature Scots Language Scottish Literature 1919

Author:T.S. Eliot

“Eugenics wis aye a gey sair pynt - the richt tae chuse yer ain mairraige pairtner, especially the wumman's richt, wis yin o thair vauntit freedoms, in contrast tae the FZ. Nanetheless, the Eugenics Law wis desingt tae discourage fowk, nae twa weys aboot it, fae hain bairns wi expensive medical problems. Parents that deleeberately incurrt costs for an avoidable genetic ill or disabeelity got nae benefits, nae maternity leave, nae schuill place for the bairn, naethin.”

Women S Rights Eugenics Scots Language Disabilities Welfare Benefits Genetic Disorders

Book:Braken Fences

Source: Braken Fences

“Scots words to tell to your heart how they wrung it and held it, the toil of their days and unendingly their fight. And the next minute that passed from you, you were English, back to the English words so sharp and clean and true - for a while, till they slid so smooth from your throat you knew they could never say anything that was worth the saying at all.”

English Language Scots Language

Book:A Scots Quair: Sunset Song, Cloud Howe, Grey Granite

Source: A Scots Quair: Sunset Song, Cloud Howe, Grey Granite

“An as he skellied intae the white bleeze, a troop o surveillance puggies advanced in heelstergowdie formation alang the corridor roof, skited by owre his heid an wi a clatter o metallic cleuks, skittered awa eastwards doon the shadowy vennel.”

Surveillance Drones Scots Language Vennel

Book:But n Ben A-Go-Go

Source: But n Ben A-Go-Go

“It seems ti me that the're a whein o guid grunds for owresettin the Shakespeare play intil Scots. For ae thing, the action is set maistlie in Scotland an the dramatis personae is maistlie Scots. For aw, it haes becom an English stage tradeition ti knap the plays o Shakespeare in a clippit ferr back Inglish accent, an whan this is duin wi Macbeth, it is ill ti credit that the action haes oniething to dae wi Scotland at aw. For another thing, Shakespeare's play is nou that weill-kent that monie skreids in it ir nou clichés - wurds that war aince fou o virr haes becum sachless owre the hunders o year sen they war written.”

William Shakespeare Scots Language Macbeth

Book:Scots Glasnost VII: April 1993

Source: Scots Glasnost VII: April 1993