Ossian is the narrator, and supposed author, of a
cycle of poems which the
Scottish
poet
James Macpherson claimed to
have translated from ancient sources in the
Scots Gaelic. He is based on
Oisín, son of Finn or
Fionn mac Cumhaill, a character from
Irish mythology. The furor over the
authenticity of the poems continued into the 20th century.
The poems
In
1760 Macpherson published the
English-language text
Fragments of Ancient Poetry collected in
the Highlands of Scotland, and later that year obtained
further manuscripts.
In 1761 he claimed to have found an
epic
on the subject of the hero Fingal, written by Ossian. The name
Fingal or
Fionnghall means "white stranger".
He published translations of it during the next few years,
culminating in a collected edition;
The Works of Ossian,
in
1765. The most famous of these poems was
Fingal written in
1762.
The poems achieved international success (even
Napoleon became a great fan) and were proclaimed as
a Celtic equivalent of the
Classical writers such as
Homer. Many writers were influenced by the works,
including the young
Walter Scott and
the German writer
Johann
Wolfgang von Goethe, whose own German translation of a portion
of Macpherson's work figures prominently in a climactic scene of
The Sorrows of Young
Werther.
Goethe's associate
Johann
Gottfried Herder wrote an essay titled
Extract from a
correspondence about Ossian and the Songs of Ancient Peoples
in the early days of the
Sturm und
Drang movement.
The poem
was as much admired in Hungary
as in France
and Germany; Hungarian János Arany
wrote "Homer and Ossian" in response, and several other Hungarian
writers - Baróti Szabó,
Csokonai, Sándor Kisfaludy, Kazinczy, Kölcsey,
Ferenc Toldy, and Ágost Greguss, were also influenced by
it.
In
Italy
the translation of Ossian by Melchiore Cesarotti made that work
highly popular, and among others it influenced Ugo Foscolo who was Cesarotti's pupil in the
University of
Padua.
The poems also exerted an influence on the burgeoning of
Romantic music, and
Franz Schubert in particular composed
Lieder setting many of Ossian's poems.
Authenticity debate
There were immediate disputes of Macpherson's claims on both
literary and political grounds.
Macpherson
promoted a Scottish origin for the material, and was hotly opposed
by Irish
historians
who felt that their heritage was being appropriated.
However, both Scotland and Ireland shared a common
Gaelic culture during the period in which the poems
are set and some
Fenian literature
common in both countries was composed in Scotland.
A great detractor of the Ossian poems was
Samuel Johnson, who had no knowledge of the
Scottish Gaelic language or of the
Gaelic tradition. Johnson believed
that they were not only not authentic, but were, moreover, not even
good poetry. Upon being asked, "But Doctor Johnson, do you really
believe that any man today could write such poetry?" he famously
replied, "Yes. Many men. Many women. And many children."
Faced with the controversy, the Committee of the
Highland Society enquired after the
authenticity of Macpherson's supposed original. It was thanks to
these circumstances that the so-called
Glenmasan manuscript (Adv. 72.2.3) came
to light, a compilation which contains the tale
Oided mac
n-Uisnig.
This text is a version of the Irish
Longes mac n-Uislenn
and offers a tale which bears some comparison to Macpherson's
"Darthula", although it is radically different in many respects.
Donald Smith cited it in his report for
the Committee.
The controversy raged on into the early years of the 19th century,
with disputes as to whether the poems were based on Irish sources,
on sources in English, on Gaelic fragments woven into his own
composition as Johnson concluded , or largely on Scots Gaelic oral
traditions and manuscripts as Macpherson claimed.
Scottish author
Hugh Blair's
1763 A Critical Dissertation on the Poems of
Ossian upheld the work's authenticity against Johnson's
scathing criticism and from 1765 was included in every edition of
Ossian to lend the work credibility.
In 1952
Derick Thomson concluded that
Macpherson had collected Scottish Gaelic
ballads, employing scribes to record those that were
preserved orally and collating manuscripts, but had adapted them by
altering the original characters and ideas, and had introduced a
great deal of his own.
Editions
- 1996: The Poems of Ossian and Related Works, ed.
Howard Gaskill, with an Introduction by Fiona Stafford (Edinburgh:
Edinburgh Univ. Press).
Notes
See also
References
- George F. Black, Macpherson's Ossian and the Ossianic
Controversy, New York, (1926).
- Patrick MacGregor, M.A., The Genuine Remains of Ossian,
Literally Translated, Highland Society of London,
(1841)
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