Hugh MacDiarmid
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Extremes meet.
Hugh MacDiarmid (11 August 1892 – 9 September 1978) is the pen name of Christopher Murray Grieve, who was a leading Scottish poet. He was a member of the Communist party and a prominent Scots Nationalist.
Quotes
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The figs frae't is my metier, I think.
I want for my part
Only the little white rose of Scotland
That smells sharp and sweet — and breaks the heart.
- I amna fou' sae muckle as tired — deid dune.
It's gey and hard wark coupin' gless for gless
Wi' Cruivie and Gilsanquhar and the like,
And I'm no' juist as bauld as aince I wes.- A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle (1926), opening lines
- I'll ha'e nae hauf-way hoose, but aye be whaur
Extremes meet — it's the only way I ken
To dodge the curst conceit o' bein' richt
That damns the vast majority o' men.- A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle (1926), ll. 141–4
- These lines are on MacDiarmid's tombstone
- To meddle wi the thistle and to pluck
The figs frae't is my metier, I think.- A Drunk Man Looks at the Thistle (1926), ll. 341–2
- The figs = the thistle's flower heads
- The number of people who can copulate properly may be few; the number who can write well are infinitely fewer.
- Review of Lady Chatterley's Lover (1928)
- If there's a sword-like sang
That can cut Scotland clear
O a' the warld beside
Rax me the hilt o't here.For there's nae jewal till
Frae the rest o earth it's free,
Wi the starry separateness
I'd fain to Scotland gie.- To Circumjack Cencrastus
- The rose of all the world is not for me.
I want for my part
Only the little white rose of Scotland
That smells sharp and sweet — and breaks the heart.- The Little White Rose
