British literature in languages other than English

In addition to

Subsequently, the impact of British Unionism led to the partition of the island of Ireland in 1921, which means that literature of the Republic of Ireland is not British, although literature from Northern Ireland, is both Irish and British.^[3] More recently the relationship between England and Wales and Scotland, has changed, through the establishment of parliaments in both those countries, in addition to the British parliament in London.

Early Britain: 450 – 1100 A.D.

Following the

Early English Jewish literature developed after the Norman Conquest with Jewish settlement in England. Berechiah ha-Nakdan is known chiefly as the author of a 13th-century set of over a hundred fables, called Mishle Shualim, (Fox Fables).^[8] The development of Jewish literature in medieval England ended with the Edict of Expulsion of 1290.

The multilingual nature of the audience for literature in the 14th century can be illustrated by the example of John Gower (c. 1330 – October 1408). A contemporary of William Langland and a personal friend of Geoffrey Chaucer, Gower is remembered primarily for three major works, the Mirroir de l'Omme, Vox Clamantis, and Confessio Amantis, three long poems written in Anglo-Norman, Latin, and Middle English respectively, which are united by common moral and political themes.^[9]

Dafydd ap Gwilym (c. 1315/1320 – c. 1350/1370), is widely regarded as the leading Welsh poet^{[10][11][12][13]} and amongst the great poets of Europe in the Middle Ages. His main themes are love and nature. The influence of the ideas of courtly love, found in the troubadour poetry of Provençal, was a significant influence on his poetry.^[14]

Major Scottish writers from the 15th century include Henrysoun, Dunbar, Douglas and Lyndsay, who wrote in Middle Scots, often simply called English, the dominant language of Scotland.

In the Cornish language, Passhyon agan Arloedh ("The Passion of our Lord"), a poem of 259 eight-line verses written in 1375, is one of the earliest surviving works of Cornish literature. The most important work of literature surviving from the Middle Cornish period is An Ordinale Kernewek ("The Cornish Ordinalia"), a 9000-line religious drama composed around the year 1400. Three plays in Cornish known as the Ordinalia have survived from this period.^[15]

The Renaissance: 1500–1660

The spread of printing affected the transmission of literature across Britain and Ireland. The first book printed in English, William Caxton's own translation of Recuyell of the Historyes of Troye, was printed abroad in 1473, to be followed by the establishment of the first printing press in England in 1474. The establishment of a printing press in Scotland under royal patent from James IV in 1507 made it easier to disseminate Scottish literature.^[16] The first printing press in Ireland followed later in 1551. Although the first book in Welsh to be printed was produced by John Prise in 1546, restrictions on printing meant that only clandestine presses, such as that of Robert Gwyn who published Y Drych Cristionogawl in 1586/1587, could operate in Wales until 1695. The first legal printing press to be set up in Wales was in 1718 by Isaac Carter.^[17] The first printed work in Manx dates from 1707: a translation of a Prayer Book catechism in English by Bishop Thomas Wilson. Printing arrived even later in other parts of Britain and Ireland: the first printing press in Jersey was set up by Mathieu Alexandre in 1784.^[18] The earliest datable text in Manx (preserved in 18th-century manuscripts), a poetic history of the Isle of Man from the introduction of Christianity, dates to the 16th century at the latest.

The

The Renaissance in Wales was marked by humanism and scholarship. The Welsh language, its grammar and lexicography, was studied for the first time and biblical studies flourished. Welsh writers such as John Owen and William Vaughan wrote in Latin or English to communicate their ideas outside Wales, but the humanists were unsuccessful in opening the established practices of professional Welsh poets to Renaissance influences.^[17] From the Reformation until the 19th century most literature in the Welsh language was religious in character. Morgan Llwyd's Llyfr y Tri Aderyn ("The Book of the Three Birds") (1653) took the form of a dialogue between an eagle (representing secular authority, particularly Cromwell); a dove (representing the Puritans); and a raven (representing the Anglican establishment).

The Reformation and vernacular literature

At the

The earliest surviving examples of Cornish prose are Pregothow Treger (The Tregear Homilies), a set of 66 sermons translated from English by John Tregear 1555–1557.

In 1567 William Salesbury's Welsh translations of the New Testament and Book of Common prayer were published. William Morgan's translation of the whole Bible followed in 1588 and remained the standard Welsh Bible until well into the 20th century.

The first Irish translation of the New Testament was begun by

The Book of Common Order was translated into Scottish Gaelic by Séon Carsuel (John Carswell), Bishop of the Isles, and printed in 1567. This is considered the first printed book in Scottish Gaelic though the language resembles classical Irish.^[23] The Irish translation of the Bible dating from the Elizabethan period was in use in Scotland until the Bible was translated into Scottish Gaelic.^[24] James Kirkwood (1650–1709) promoted Gaelic education and attempted to provide a version of William Bedell's Bible translations into Irish, edited by his friend Robert Kirk (1644–1692), which failed, though he did succeed in publishing a Psalter in Gaelic (1684).^[25][26]

The Book of Common Prayer was translated into French by Jerseyman

The Book of Common Prayer and

Translations of parts of the Bible into Cornish have existed since the 17th century. The early works involved the translation of individual passages, chapters or books of the Bible

Latin literature

Latin continued in use as a language of learning, long after the Reformation had established the vernacular as the liturgical language. In Scotland, Latin as a literary language thrived into the 17th century as Scottish writers writing in Latin were able to engage with their audiences on an equal basis in a prestige language without feeling hampered by their less confident handling of English.^[28]

Iain Lom (c. 1624 – c. 1710) was a Royalist Scottish Gaelic poet appointed poet laureate in Scotland by Charles II at the Restoration. He delivered a eulogy for the coronation, and remained loyal to the Stuarts after 1688, opposing the Williamites and later, in his vituperative Oran an Aghaidh an Aonaidh, the 1707 Union of the Parliaments.^[29]

Cín Lae Uí Mhealláin is an account of the Irish Confederate Wars which "reflected the Ulster Catholic point of view" written by Tarlach Ó Mealláin.

Nicholas Boson (1624–1708) wrote three significant texts in Cornish, Nebbaz gerriau dro tho Carnoack (A Few Words about Cornish) between 1675 and 1708; Jowan Chy-an-Horth, py, An try foynt a skyans (John of Chyannor, or, The three points of wisdom), published by Edward Lhuyd in 1707, though written earlier; and The Dutchess of Cornwall's Progress, partly in English, now known only in fragments. The first two are the only known surviving Cornish prose texts from the 17th century.^[30]

In Scotland, after the 17th century,

18th century

The Union of the Parliaments of Scotland and England in 1707 to form a single Kingdom of Great Britain and the creation of a joint state by the Acts of Union had little impact on the literature of England nor on national consciousness among English writers. The situation in Scotland was different: the desire to maintain a cultural identity while partaking of the advantages offered by the English literary market and English literary standard language led to what has been described as the "invention of British literature" by Scottish writers. English writers, if they considered Britain at all, tended to assume it was merely England writ large; Scottish writers were more clearly aware of the new state as a "cultural amalgam comprising more than just England".^[32]

Ellis Wynne's Gweledigaetheu y Bardd Cwsc ('Visions of the Sleeping Bard'), first published in London in 1703, is regarded as a Welsh language classic. It is generally said that no better model exists of such 'pure' idiomatic Welsh, before writers had become influenced by English style and method.

A mover in the classical revival of Welsh literature in the 18th century was Lewis Morris, one of the founders in 1751 of the Honourable Society of Cymmrodorion, a Welsh literary society in London—at that time the most important centre of Welsh publishing.^[17] He set out to counter the trend among patrons of Welsh literature to turn towards English culture. He attempted to recreate a classic school of Welsh poetry with his support for Goronwy Owen and other Augustans. Goronwy Owen's plans for a Miltonic epic were never achieved, but influenced the aims of eisteddfodau competitions through the 19th century.^[33]

The Scottish Gaelic national poet Alasdair mac Mhaighstir Alasdair also compiled the first secular book in Scottish Gaelic to be printed: Leabhar a Theagasc Ainminnin (1741), a Gaelic-English glossary. The second secular book in Scottish Gaelic to be published was his 1751 Jacobite poetry collection Ais-Eiridh na Sean Chánoin Albannaich (The Resurrection of the Ancient Scottish Language). Alasdair mac Mhaighstir Alasdair was the most overtly nationalist poet in Gaelic of the 18th century.^[28]

In the introduction to his groundbreaking

Catriona Nic Fhearghais are among woman poets who reflected on the crushing effects on traditional Gaelic culture of the aftermath of the Jacobite uprisings. A consequent sense of desolation pervaded the works of Scottish Gaelic writers such as Dughall Bochanan which mirrored many of the themes of the graveyard poets writing in England.^[28] A legacy of Jacobite verse was later compiled (and adapted) by James Hogg

in his Jacobite Reliques (1819).

As part of the oral literature of the Highlands, few of the works of the village poets were published at the time, although the oral poetry from some, including highly important Gairloch Bard and Schoolmaster William Ross, have been collected from those who had memorized them and published since.^[28]

In the

Allan Ramsay

's The Gentle shepherd between 1743 and 1793.

19th century

The Welsh novel in English starts with "

industrial novel and the rural romance. Serial fiction in Welsh had been appearing from 1822 onwards, but the work to be recognisable as the first novel in Welsh was William Ellis Jones' 1830 "Y Bardd, neu y Meudwy Cymreig". This was a moralistic work, as were many of the productions of the time. The first major novelist in the Welsh language was Daniel Owen (1836–1895), author of works such as Rhys Lewis (1885) and Enoc Huws (1891).^[17]

The first novel in Scottish Gaelic was John MacCormick's Dùn-Àluinn, no an t-Oighre 'na Dhìobarach, which was serialised in the People's Journal in 1910, before publication in book form in 1912. The publication of a second Scottish Gaelic novel, An t-Ogha Mòr by Angus Robertson, followed within a year.^[36]

Fr.

symbolism, surrealism, and many other innovations from world literature

in immortal works of Gaelic poetry that were only published long after his death.

Philippe Le Sueur Mourant's Jèrriais tales of Bram Bilo, an innocent abroad in Paris, were an immediate success in Jersey in 1889 and went through a number of reprintings.^[37]

Ewen MacLachlan (Gaelic: Eoghan MacLachlainn) (1775–1822) was a Scots poet of this period who translated the first eight books of Homer's Iliad into Scottish Gaelic. He also composed and published his own Gaelic Attempts in Verse (1807) and Metrical Effusions (1816), and contributed greatly to the 1828 Gaelic–English Dictionary.

Ulster Scots poetry, Robert Huddlestone

(1814–1887) in paving, Writers' Square, Belfast

Increased literacy in rural and outlying areas and wider access to publishing through, for example, local newspapers encouraged regional literary development as the 19th century progressed. Some writers in lesser-used languages and dialects of the islands gained a literary following outside their native regions, for example William Barnes (1801–86) in Dorset, George Métivier (1790–1881) in Guernsey and Robert Pipon Marett (1820–84) in Jersey.^[37]

George Métivier published Rimes Guernesiaises, a collection of poems in Guernésiais and French in 1831 and Fantaisies Guernesiaises in 1866. Métivier's poems had first appeared in newspapers from 1813 onward, but he spent time in Scotland in his youth where he became familiar with the Scots literary tradition although he was also influenced by Occitan literature. The first printed anthology of Jèrriais poetry, Rimes Jersiaises, was published in 1865.

The so-called "

Celticist John Hobson Matthews from John Davey of Boswednack, one of the last local storytellers with some traditional knowledge of the Cornish language,^[38] may be the last piece of traditional Cornish oral literature to be collected after its official language death

.

John Ceiriog Hughes desired to restore simplicity of diction and emotional sincerity and do for Welsh poetry what Wordsworth and Coleridge did for English poetry.

literary translation of Aesop

's Fables into Manx Gaelic.

The development of Irish literary culture was encouraged in the late 19th and early 20th century by the

English culture. While drama was an important component of this movement, it also included prose and poetry and heavily inspired the Welsh nationalism of Saunders Lewis

.

20th century

love poem in the whole history of Scottish Gaelic literature

. Before his death in 1967, his complete poems were written down from his dictation and published posthumously in 1969.

Welsh poet

Bardic Chair at the 1917 National Eisteddfod of Wales. He later the subject of an Oscar-nominated 1990 Welsh-language film directed by Paul Turner.^[17]

ultra-nationalism. Rev. Evans-Jones, whom Alan Llwyd considers the greatest Welsh poet of the Great War, is best known under the bardic name of Cynan

. Welsh poet Alan Llwyd's English translations of many poems by both poets appear in the volume Out of the Fire of Hell; Welsh Experience of the Great War 1914–1918 in Prose and Verse.

David Jones first published in 1937, is a notable work of the literature of the First World War

, that was influenced by Welsh traditions, despite Jones being born in England.

Poetry reflecting life on the home-front was also published; Guernésiais writer Thomas Henry Mahy's collection Dires et Pensées du Courtil Poussin, published in 1922, contained some of his observational poems published in La Gazette de Guernesey during the war.

In the late 19th century and early twentieth-century,

cultural nationalist writers to embrace this effort were Saunders Lewis (1893–1985) and Kate Roberts

(1891–1985), both of whom began publishing in the 1910s. Kate Roberts' and Saunders Lewis's careers continued after World War II and they both were among the foremost Welsh-language authors of the twentieth century.

The year 1922 marked both the end of the Irish War of Independence and a significant change in the relationship between Great Britain and Ireland, with the setting up of the Irish Free State in the predominantly Catholic South, while the predominantly Protestant Northern Ireland remained part of the United Kingdom.

Even so, in the aftermath of the

Second World War there were a large number of Irish working in Britain in the construction industry, rebuilding the cities destroyed during The Blitz by Luftwaffe bombs, and as nurses. Many of them, both in provincial towns and in London, were from the Gaeltachtaí, and Irish was commonly heard on building sites, in Irish pubs, and in dance halls.^[39]

While rebuilding the bombed damaged cities of postwar Britain,

Valentine Iremonger

and published in 1964 under the title An Irish Navvy: The Diary of an Exile.

Nationalist movements in Britain, especially in Wales and Scotland, also significantly influenced writers in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. Referendums held in Wales and in Scotland eventually resulted in the establishment of a form of self-government in both countries.

The

magical realism inspired by the Latin American Boom

.

21st century literature

Contemporary writers in Scottish Gaelic include

language revival, published Dunveryssyn yn Tooder-Folley (The Vampire Murders) — the first full-length novel ever written in Manx.^[42] His autobiography Gaelg as Fishig: Skeeal my Vea ("Manx and Physics: The Story of my Life") was published posthumously in 2019.^[43] There is also a boom of modern literature being written and published in Irish language in Northern Ireland. According to Innti poet Louis de Paor, Belfast Irish, "a new urban dialect", of Ulster Irish, was "forged in the heat of Belfast during The Troubles".^[44]

For example,

Gaeltacht Quarter of West Belfast.^[45] Simultaneously, the Turas organisation in East Belfast continues to seek, with considerable success, to promote the Irish language revival among Ulster Protestants

.

The theatrical landscape has been reconfigured, moving from a single London-based National Theatre at the end of the twentieth-century to four as a result of the effects of political devolution upon cultural policy.^[46]

With the

similar language revival of the Cornish language there have also been new literary works written and published in the language. The first full translation of the Bible into Cornish was published in 2011.^[47]

See also

• Breton literature
• Irish language outside Ireland
• Languages of Ireland
• Languages of the United Kingdom
• List of Cornish writers

References

1. ^ Pliny the Elder's Naturalis Historia Book IV. Chapter XLI Latin text and English translation, numbered Book 4, Chapter 30, at the
   Perseus Project
   .
2. ^ Jones & Casey 1988:367–98 "The Gallic Chronicle Restored: a Chronology for the Anglo-Saxon Invasions and the End of Roman Britain"
3. ISBN 0091613612
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4. ^ Jackson (1969)—the work is titled The Gododdin: the oldest Scottish poem.
5. ^ "Orkneyjar - The History and Archaeology of the Orkney Islands".
6. ISBN 0-85115-673-8
7. ^ Burgess, ed., xiii;
8. ^ "Adventures in Philosophy: A Brief History of Jewish Philosophy". Radicalacademy.com. Archived from the original on 1 September 2011. Retrieved 6 January 2013.
9. ^ "Gower, John" . Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900.
10. ISBN 1851094407
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11. ISBN 0715404571
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12. ISBN 0321333977
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13. ISBN 9780708323571
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14. ^ Rachel Bromwich, Aspects of the Poetry of Dafydd ap Gwilym (Cardiff, University of Wales Press, 1986).
15. ^ A Handbook of the Cornish Language, by Henry Jenner A Project Gutenberg eBook;A brief history of the Cornish language Archived 2008-12-25 at the Wayback Machine.
16. ISBN 1-84384-096-0
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17. ^
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18. ISBN 1860770657
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19. ISBN 9780521189682
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20. ^ William O'Domhnuill's (Daniel's) Translation of the New Testament into Irish. Retrieved on 2 April 2010.
21. ^ "Treasures of the Irish Language: Some early examples from Dublin City Public Libraries". 2006. Archived from the original on 9 March 2012. Retrieved 3 October 2012.
22. ^ "Bedell's Irish Old Testament". King's College London. Retrieved 3 October 2012.
23. ^ Felicity Heal Reformation in Britain and Ireland – Page 282 2005 "In Irish the catechism long preceded the printing of the New Testament, while in Scottish Gaelic the Form of Common Order was printed in 1567, the full Bible not until 1801. Manx Gaelic had no Bible until the eighteenth century:"
24. ^ Mackenzie, Donald W. (1990–92). "The Worthy Translator: How the Scottish Gaels got the Scriptures in their own Tongue". Transactions of the Gaelic Society of Inverness. 57: 168–202.
25. ^ Tony Claydon, Ian McBride – Protestantism and National Identity: Britain and Ireland Page 176 2007 "The failure of Kirkwood's scheme, and in particular of the Scottish Gaelic bible, which had been adapted from the original Irish translation by Kirkwood's friend Robert Kirk, has often been attributed to the incompatibility of Irish and ."
26. ^ William Ferguson – The Identity of the Scottish Nation: An Historic Quest Page 243 1998 "Here it is salutary to recall the difficulties that Robert Kirk had experienced when turning the Irish Bible into Scottish Gaelic. Those difficulties were real and by no means imaginary or due to fastidious pedantry on Kirk's part."
27. ^ "Hildesley, Mark" . Dictionary of National Biography. London: Smith, Elder & Co. 1885–1900.
28. ^
    ISBN 9780140299403
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29. ^
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30. ISBN 0-903686-09-0
31. ISBN 0521284090
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32. ISBN 0198119550
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33. ISBN 0140225897
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34. ^ John Lorne Campbell (1979), Highland Songs of the Forty-Five, Arno Press. Pages xvii – xxxvi.
35. ^ Campbell (1971), p. 35, footnote No. 3.
36. ^ "The forgotten first: John Maccormick's DÙN-ÀLUINN" (PDF). Retrieved 6 January 2013.
37. ^
    ISBN 2-905385-13-8
38. ^ Ellis, P. B. The Cornish language and its literature; p. 129.
39. ^ Mac Amhlaigh, Dónall. Dialann Deoraí. An Clóchomhar Tta 1960. The standard autobiographical account of an Irish navvy's life in the period in question.
40. ^ [1], Scotsman,2007.
41. ISBN 1-903341-47-7
42. ^ "Isle of Man Today article on Dunveryssyn yn Tooder-Folley". Iomonline.co.im. 1 January 2013. Archived from the original on 26 August 2006. Retrieved 6 January 2013.
43. ^ "Manx language stalwart's posthumous autobiography". IOM Today. 3 December 2019. Retrieved 14 August 2020.
44. ^ Louis de Paor (2016), Leabhar na hAthghabhála: Poems of Repossession: Irish-English Bilingual Edition, Bloodaxe Books. Page 27.
45. ^ Mac Póilin, Aodán. "Irish language literature in Belfast". The Cities of Belfast. Retrieved 29 March 2013.
46. ^ Dickson, Andrew (2 August 2011). "Edinburgh festival 2011: where National Theatres meet". The Guardian. Retrieved 4 November 2012.
47. ^ An Beybel Sans: The Holy Bible in Cornish