That's What We Call Full Spectrum

Ask pretty much any Scotsperson and they'll tell you that the Scots invented everything. Generally speaking, when such topics of conversation come up in my presence, I nod and agree and fall back on a completely true positive statement: Scotland is the most beautiful place I've ever been.

Yes, I do think that many superlative statements about Scotland are valid. But the Scots seem to like living in the extremes. It's the most beautiful country in the world, perhaps, and it's also the knifingest country in Europe and the drinkingest. They've got the world's preeminent theater and arts festival and bucketfuls of heroin addicts.

The Scots also offer us the best and worst in English language poetry. We'll use this simple love/luve poem by Robert Burns to demonstrate some of the best (from 1794):

O my Luve's like a red, red rose,
That's newly sprung in June:
O my Luve's like the melodie,
That's sweetly play'd in tune.

As fair art thou, my bonie lass,
So deep in luve am I;
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
Till a' the seas gang dry.

Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear,
And the rocks melt wi' the sun;
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
While the sands o' life shall run.

And fare-thee-weel, my only Luve!
And fare-thee-weel, a while!
And I will come again, my Luve,
Tho' 'twere ten thousand mile!

Burns plays with language and repetition and beauty, and one can really feel the power of his luve. Yes, it's good shit, and Robert Burns is so revered (and rightly so) he gets a national holiday.

William Topaz McGonagall--poet, tragedian, hand loom weaver--is also a product of Scotland. Widely hailed as the writer of the worst poetry in the English language, he composed his poetry "under the divine inspiration." Yes. Yes, he did. For example, from some time in the late 1800s:

'TWAS on a Monday morning, and in the year of 1884,
That a fire broke out in Bailie Bradford's store,
Which contained bales of jute and large quantities of waste,
Which the brave firemen ran to extinguish in great haste.

They left their wives that morning without any dread,
Never thinking, at the burning pile, they would be killed dead
By the falling of the rickety and insecure walls;
When I think of it, kind Christians, my heart it appals!

Because it has caused widows and their families to shed briny tears,
For there hasn't been such a destructive fire for many years;
Whereby four brave firemen have perished in the fire,
And for better fathers or husbands no family could desire.

It goes on for eighteen stanzas, dear B&E readers, but I think you get the point. If you haven't yet had your appetite for McGonagall sated, this archive is your online home.

A special thank you to Yahoo! News for bringing my attention to the Bard of Obvious Rhymes.