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Poe's Scottish Connections
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Searching For Poe In Scotland
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Several professors of various disciplines have written, mostly e-mails. All have been laudatory; however, some have appeared reluctant or embarrassed about being identified with a quote of their remarks, so I do not include them. Where we have been published or discussed in the publications of others, such as The Burns Chronicle, Frank Beattie's local history books, and so on, we do not quote as the knowledge of these materials is well known by Scots, and not regarded by most academic Americans as important. Quotes presented here, however, are samples.
“I believe that you are conducting original and significant work on Poe and wish you the very best of luck in publishing it in the future.
Best wishes,
Chris Gair"
[Managing Editor, Symbiosis, and Professor, Department of American and Canadian Studies, The University of Birmingham, England. Principle Director of the Annual International Conference, Symbiosis, which seeks to join an understanding of Trans-Atlantic Literature and Culture between North American and Scotland.]
~Brill presented a paper to the 5th Symbiosis Conference, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece, June 2005, on “Edgar Allan Poe’s Rejection of the Church of Scotland’s Calvinism.”~
“With your interest in Robert Burns and Edgar Allan Poe you should start a Burns-Poe Club or Society on the Internet. In that way you could devote your energies to both literary figures at the same time.”
Murdo Morrison, Past President of the Robert Burns Federation, Ltd., Kilmarnock, Scotland,
and Professor Emeritus of English and Gaelic, the University of Glasgow, Scotland.
“Thanks so much for the articles from the 'Ulster-Scot Newspaper.' I enjoy keeping up with your circularly efforts re, Poe’s Scottish connections. Best wishes for the holidays and 2004.”
Steve Adams, Professor of English,
and Director of Graduate Studies, the University of Minnesota, Duluth. Member of the Poe Studies Association.
| “The materials you sent me on Poe are more fascinating than anything I have seen in ages. This is the most original Poe scholarship I have seen in ages. How brilliant of you to tackle this angle.”
Raymond Foye,
Author of The Unknown Poe, City Lights Books, San Francisco, 1980.
“'Edgar Allan Poe’s Prescription for a Good Night’s Sleep' is an engaging and informative study of 'The Premature Burial.' Your imaginative reading of the story on its various levels left me with new insights and inspired me to re-read the tale on the spot. I liked especially your explication of the line “for this let us thank a merciful God!” The story of Cathy Fiscus was both sadly moving for itself and appropriate for your approach to Poe’s tale."
“I was fascinated by the descriptions of you research into Poe’s Ayrshire connections and influences. I hope you soon find a publisher for what promises to be group-breaking work that will add substantially to our knowledge of Poe’s life and writings.”
Stephen Adams,
Professor and Director of Graduate Studies.
This site, and these pages, were created and are maintained solely as time allows by Robert (Bob) Densmore Brill, M. A. (English), J. D., from his home in Kailua-Kona, Hawai'i (The Big Island). Please E-mail poeinscotland@aol.com for the most prompt response. Your comments, criticisms, comments, or questions are welcomed.
"Dear Bob,
Thanks for your message and for the brief description of your work on Poe, which sounds very interesting indeed. He's one of my favorite writers, although I'd never thought of him in connection with Nietzsche before. ...." Dr Greg Moore, President, Friedrich Nietzsche Society
Department of German
University of St Andrews www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~gm60/
friedrichnietzschesociety.wordpress.com
| align="justify">What Other Poe Scholars Are Saying…
Professor Adams has now retired from the University of Minnesota. His own web pages of his interest in Edgar Allan Poe have been removed, and he is, I think, milking sheep on a farm in Duluth! (For city folk, one does not milk sheep! My own German father was from a family of sharecroppers in Wabashaw County, Chester Township, Minnesota, and he never told me a single story about life in that state, but the dreadful cold of Duluth, where he once was a lumber jack.) The breath and depth of Professor Adams' material, and what and how he taught Poe were blinding. I never would have qualified to enter any of his courses. There are hundreds of dedicated, driven investigators of information of and about Poe; therefore, I am honored to have been in communication with Professor Adams before he disappeared from the university.
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MEMORANDUM
Although the BBC Scotland Radio broadcast, "Scots Gothic: A Portrait of Edgar Allan Poe in Ayrshire," produced by Billy Kay, has come and gone, I leave the balance of my Memo for those interested in the points that I attempted to share before it aired.
While America and many of her residents are in the throws of a dreadful year of economic and personal financial dispare, 2007 was my worst in 25 years. Nevertheless, so important to my resume was the BBC Scotland Radio program, that I went on with it anyway.
31 July 2007, Kailua-Kona, Hawaii, USA Interview with Billy Kay, Director of Odyssey Productions, on Behalf of BBC Scotland Radio,
“Edgar Allan Poe’s Scottish Connections,”
with Robert Densmore Brill and Grace Kimi Kenmotsu My Poe in Scotland Research Project, and the manuscript in progress of my biography that grew out of it, “Mar’se Eddie” in The Shire, Edgar Allan Poe’s Scottish Connections, have gathered much interest since our first research trip to Ayrshire, Scotland, in 1997. Although no academics nor scholars up to that time, and few Scots who make it their business to know local history and literature, knew much of Edgar Allan Poe’s presence in Scotland. Nevertheless, the project has since gathered a considerable awareness in Great Britain.
Knowledge of my project and findings have been slowly reaching those with a keen interest in everything concerned with Edgar Allan Poe’s life and work. I have, nevertheless, deliberately withheld notice and information of the project from Americans outside of our Scottish-American communities until the book is published. The reason is that everyone in Ayrshire was extremely receptive of our discoveries. We continue to communicate with many there who were instrumental in providing resources and sources of information which I have written of in my manuscript. For purposes of copyright protection, a copy is held by the Archivist of the Dundonald Parish Church.
Largely from these people, some lay persons, some local worthies, as well as my visits to local sites, interviews with many local museum and research library staff in and around Ayrshire, as well as local newspaper articles and other publications, “word of mouth” has been the source that led to our BBC Scotland Radio interview. On Saturday, July 14, 2007, Grace Kenmotsu (CSU-Sacramento 1976) and me (UC-Davis ’73; CSU-Sac ‘82; UNC Law ’84) were interviewed by the Director of Odyssey Productions, Billy Kay, native and resident of Scotland, at our hotel in San Diego.
Billy had invited the interview last October. Nevertheless, without going to Great Britain, this would be his first opportunity of a rendezvous in America. Grace and I flew in from Bangkok that morning.
I have not worked on my 800 page manuscript for the five years that I have been retired to Kailua-Kona, Hawaii; nevertheless, I attempted to answer Mr. Kay’s questions from memory. Subjects of specific interest to Mr. Kay, nevertheless, such as the tangible influences in Scotland upon Master (“Mar’se Eddie”) Allan’s mind, personality, and literature were discussed and recorded. For example, Edgar Allan Poe’s relationship to his adoptive father, John Allan, and Poe’s relationship to John Allan’s cousin, the Scots poet, Robert Burns, were central to Poe wanting to be a poet himself. It was Edgar Allan Poe’s conscious decision to become a poet as well, against his father’s and family’s (i.e. Scots novelist, John Galt (also of Irvine) wishes, but also Edgar Allan Poe became a poet who purposely wrote in a most heinous genre. On the other hand, Burns is known world-wide as a writer of love poetry.
Our interview lasted one hour. Mr. Kay stated that he will return to Scotland to edit our interview and conversations that he has conducted with many others in Scotland, from whom he obtained my name. [Frank Beattie, James Gracie, to name but two] Mr. Kay will produce a radio program for airing in October of this year. Notice that it airs in the month of Poe’s death! Unlike the other radio, movie, and television productions which arose out of information in our project, the BBC Scotland Radio program will be available to American audiences. Mr. Kay advises that the program will air on Wednesday, Halloween, 31 October 2007, at 11:30 a.m., and then repeated at 30 minutes past midnight. Visit their website: http://www.bbc.co.uk/scotland/ The program will air for one full week on the Internet after it is broadcast on the radio, in Scotland only.
Given his authority in Scottish culture and literature, he is very adept at using the Scots’ dialect, naturally. Moreover, his Scots’ brogue makes for more forceful use of his subject. For example, his program will feature his own discoveries and knowledge of Ayrshire’s, “ghaists and houlets,” “witches and warlocks,” “body snatchers, premature burials,” and oh, yes, “cannibals!” Mr. Kay further informed us that the program will be available via the BBC Radio Scotland website, URL: , live as it is broadcast for one full week after it is broadcast on the radio.
This Memorandum shall be sent to our acquaintances and friends at colleges, schools, organizations, and persons worldwide, who have otherwise been informed of our research project.
Any questions, comments, or advice may be sent to this writer at poeinscotland@aol.com. Please see our www.poeinscotland.com web pages for further information of production and published facts and opinions of our findings in Scotland.
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E-mail received from the director of the BBC Radio Scotland program in which some of our connections of Edgar Allan Poe in Scotland are made. "Dear Billy and Frank, Broadcast details of the programme attached and copied below. I hope you enjoy it aw the best Billy Kay BBC Radio Scotland 2007 Wednesday October 31 (Halloween) @ 11.04 repeated Sat Nov 3 @ 6.04 and via the Listen Again Facility on the Radio Scotland website for one week after broadcast. Scots Gothic: A Portrait of Edgar Allan Poe in Ayrshire. As a child, when Edgar Poe lost both his parents, he was taken in by the family of a Virginia tobacco merchant, John Allan. In 1815, when Edgar was a boy of six, the Allans came home to Irvine for an extended visit, and sent Edgar to the local school which was located over the wall from the kirk and its ancient burial ground. One of the tasks Edgar was set, was to copy epitaphs such as the following from gravestones there….. "Mourn not for me my parents dear I am not dead but sleeping here, My debt is paid my grave you see Prepare in time to follow me." "Reader prepare, times on the wing Thy hour ere long shall come, The voice that bids thee now prepare Speaks from an early tomb." In the company of local historians Billy Kerr, Mae McEwan, Neil Stirrat and Frank Beattie, Billy Kay explores the Ayrshire of "ghaists an houlets", "witches and warlocks", bodysnatchers, premature burials and cannibals - and asks whether Poe’s macabre imagination took fire in this cauldron of Scots Gothic. He will also speak to Californian Poe enthusiast, Bob Brill, who is writing a book about Poe in Ayrshire, and is fascinated by its effect on his writing and his connections to the families of two other great Ayrshire writers, John Galt and Robert Burns. Edgar Allan Poe’s autobiographical poems such as ‘Alone’, and passages from stories like ‘The Premature Burial’ will be read by actors John Buick and Keith Fleming. An Odyssey Production for Radio Scotland" I have sent original information of this broadcast production to as many in Poe scholarship as I had information. Including, today, to the Frederick Nietzsche Society, of which I am a member. Other possible scholars, such as those in the Association for Scottish Literary Studies, were not informed of this broadcast. Please share broadcast and Internet information with those whom you believe may have an interest. I have requested of the producer and BBC Scotland Radio information on availability of the DVD that resulted from this program, but have not received a reply. Both have a web site as well as e-mail access.
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