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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 23 January 2009
Odd though it may seem, the most popular contemporary playwright in Scotland over the past few years—judged in terms of frequency of productions—has not been a Scot but a Quebecer. In the four years from 1989 to 1992 there will have been four Scottish productions of Scots translations of plays by Michel Tremblay, as well as a revival of one of these shows. Glasgow's Tron Theatre staged The Guid Sisters (Les Belles-Sœurs) in 1989, revived it in 1990, and mounted a double bill of The Real Wurld? (Le vrai monde!) and Hosanna (Hosanna) in 1991; and Edinburgh's Traverse Theatre is staging The House Among the Stars (La Maison suspendue) in the autumn of 1992.
1. Tremblay, Michel, The Guid Sisters, trans. Findlay, William and Bowman, Martin, Exile Editions, Toronto, 1988Google Scholar; Tremblay, Michel, The Guid Sisters, trans. Findlay, William and Bowman, Martin, Tron Theatre, Glasgow, 1989Google Scholar; Tremblay, Michel, The Guid Sisters: Three Plays, Nick Hern Books, London, 1991.Google Scholar
2. For further discussion of this point, see Findlay, William, ‘The Scots Language Context to Translating Les Belles-Soeurs’, Image and Identity: Theatre and Cinema in Scotland and Quebec, ed. Lockerbie, Ian, The John Grierson Archive/University of Stirling, Stirling, 1988, pp. 31–4.Google Scholar
3. For a brief discussion of the history of the Scots language, including the status of contemporary Scots, see Ibid, pp. 24–31.
4. Morgan, Edwin, ‘Glasgow Speech in Recent Glasgow Literature’, Scotland and the Lowland Tongue, ed. McClure, J. Derrick, Aberdeen University Press, Aberdeen, 1983, p. 202.Google Scholar
5. Ackerman, Marianne, ‘Sweet Jesus! Who's That Ma?’, Saturday Night, 06 1988, p. 45Google Scholar; Ackerman, Marianne, ‘The English Scene Intrigues This French Playwright', The Gazette, 8 02 1986.Google Scholar
