Page 40 - Art First: Helen MacAlister: The Glamour of Backwardness

AF HM catalogue 2023 PRINT.qxp_Layout 1 15/06/2023 17:37 Page 38

St John’s nut

Responds to Tom Nairn’s The Glamour of Backwardness.

Balmorality : tushery

‘Balmorality is the word. The only state of a nation’s mind under which such iniquity could
be perpetrated with such a general show of virtue and pretended national feeling.’ 1

tushery – a conventional style of historical fiction, using many archaisms (such as ‘tush’)
[coined by r l stevenson]

1 Scotland in Quest of Her Youth: a Scrutiny, ed.– David Cleghorn Thomson, p82
(Balmorality by George Scott Moncrieff)

Scart someone’s buttons
scart someone’s buttons – run one’s fingers down another’s jacket buttons, as a challenge to fight.

“decorate the imperial order” 1

On Scots, ‘It prefers understatement to elaborate decoration. If the figure of speech called litotes
hadn’t already existed, it would have been necessary for the Scots to invent it.’ 2

1 Anthony Barnett

2 William McIlvanney, The Herald

harling

But on that day in 1707 ((signing of the Treaty of Union)) what tune did the carilloner choose to beat
out on the keys with his leather-covered fists? He was no fool. He knew the whole city was listening and
he also knew his audience understood what he meant when with the most ironic musical gesture
Scotland has ever known he chose to play ‘Why should I be sad on my wedding? 12

1 Sc’s Music – JPurser, p155