Hamish Henderson: A Biography. Volume 1 - The Making Of The Poet (1919-1953)

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I remember reading a letter from Hamish to The Scotsman, in which he railed against the Wilson Labour Government of 1966-70, because of its failure to challenge the power of international finance. God knows what he would make of globalisation. He also argued against what he described as the servile complicity of Britain in the Vietnam war. He reminded everyone who read The Scotsman that that war was the first war in which 90 per cent of the casualties were civilians. If only we had listened to him, because most of the wars since then have repeated that horror statistic. In these days, when the words socialist and revolutionary have become non-words, all of us should keep that in mind. Though he was born in Blairgowrie, Perthshire, [3] Henderson spent his early years in nearby Glen Shee and eventually moved to England with his mother. He won a scholarship to Dulwich School in London; however, his mother died shortly before he was due to take up his place and he had to live in an orphanage while studying there. [ dubious – discuss]

Hamish Henderson was generous with his time and money for people of creative talent. He was even generous towards Hugh MacDiarmid—who came from my constituency—with whom he had a famous and public dispute, as Cathy Peattie said. How important the topic of that dispute is for us today. Poetry and all culture are there for the enjoyment of all people, not just for the enjoyment of a few privileged, educated people. Our culture belongs to all of us because it comes from all of us. I, too, start by congratulating Cathy Peattie on obtaining the debate and by congratulating the various contributors. This week, a certain rather vacuous female journalist on "Newsnight" referred, in her criticism of the Scottish Parliament, to the fact that we did such things as discussing Hamish Henderson, as if that were something that a proper Parliament does not do. I believe that commemoration of such an important Scottish figure and his contribution to Scotland's song and musical traditions is a worthwhile subject for debate in the Parliament.Ian Spring (2020), Hamish Henderson: A Critical Appreciation, Rymour Books, Perth, ISBN 978-1-8381863-3-3 In my lifetime, the ascendent neoliberal agenda of globalisation has deeply transformed the material conditions of our world, and may yet bring about our ultimate destruction. Every mention of Hamish Henderson since his death on 8 March has been prefaced or followed by an anecdote. There is no doubt that he was, if not larger than life, then radically different from most of the people whom one has ever met. He wore his convictions, his passions and his appetites on the outside of his large and gangling frame. That meant that one got from him a very direct experience of a unique, great man. It would seem customary, when writing about Henderson, to start with a personal anecdote. Sadly, I never actually met him – although I did study and go on to teach for several years in the university department that was formerly the School of Scottish Studies, where Henderson was a founding member. This place and this community has gifted me so much. Henderson’s cultural imagination has been a huge influence on my own; I was delighted, then, to be invited to share my thoughts on ‘why Hamish matters’ in our time, as part of a wider conversation. The 51st Highland Division's Farewell to Sicily by Hamish Henderson". Scottish Poetry Library (in Inglis) . Retrieved 23 Januar 2022.

In August 2013, Edinburgh University announced that it had acquired his personal archive of "more than 10,000 letters from almost 3400 correspondents, plus 136 notebooks and diaries", dating from the 1930s to the end of his life. [11] These will be kept in the Special Collections department of the main library. [12]Henderson continued to host the events every year until 1954, when the Communist ties of several members of the People's Festival Committee led to the Labour Party declaring it a "Proscribed Organisation". Losing the financial support of the local trades unions, the People's Festival was permanently cancelled. [6] Henderson's own songs, particularly " Freedom Come All Ye", have become part of the folk tradition themselves. [3] Later life [ edit ]

Hamish Henderson (1987), " Antonio Gramsci" in Ross, Raymond J. (ed.), Cencrastus No. 28, Winter 87/88, pp.22 – 26, ISSN 0264-0856 In another article, which was published in The Scotsman 10 years later, Hamish Henderson referred to the painful experiences of the Scottish Labour Party, when one third of the party was expelled for claiming to be revolutionary as well as socialist. He wrote: Hamish Henderson supported many causes, including nuclear disarmament, the anti-apartheid movement, international socialism, home rule and, possibly, independence for Scotland. He saw no contradiction between being a patriotic Scot and being a believer in international solidarity. That is an important factor, because there is often a contradiction in people, who believe that, somehow, pride in one's nation or culture means that one cannot respect the traditions and cultures of others. That is not the case—it is through understanding, creating and caring for one's own culture that one learns to respect and appreciate the pride that others have in their cultures. That was an important gift that people such as Hamish Henderson gave our country. He was also a great linguist and a highly original translator of poetry. He often translated new poetry from Gaelic, French, German and Latin—often into Scots. Compassion, rough humanity, sincerity and emotional truth were words that defined Hamish's whole life and Scotland still has need of them.But he also had to grapple with Gramsci’s view of folklore as Janus-faced. Gramsci spoke of ‘various strata’ — beside the ‘often creative and progressive ones’ he also highlighted ‘the fossilized ones which reflect conditions of past life and are therefore conservative and reactionary’. Henderson called it Gramsci’s ‘unresolved but creative clash of contradictions’. While recognising these tensions, where he perhaps parted with Gramsci was when the latter claimed that folk culture had to be ‘overcome’ and that, in Corey Gibson’s words, ‘folklore can have no place in the development of a working-class hegemony and, therefore, no place in the revolutionary future as imagined by a Gramscian Marxism’.