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William Soutar
1898-1943
William Soutar (1898- 1943) was born and educated in Perth. He spent his
war service with the Royal Navy from 1916 to 1919, and then went on to Edinburgh
University to complete his education. Enrolled as a medical student, Soutar
soon transferred to English Literature and graduated in 1923. A verse collection,
Gleanings by an Undergraduate, was published anonymously at this time. Suffering
from a progressive disease of the spine, Soutar returned to his parent’s house
in Perth to take up what amounted to a lifetime of private study, and by 1930
he was permanently confined to bed. He produced several volumes of poems in
English in the following fourteen years, but by this time Soutar was also experimenting
with Scots, and ‘bairn-rhymes’ in particular. His first poems in this mode were
published as Seeds in The Wind (1933), with Poems in Scots in 1935 and Riddles
in Scots in 1937. The most complete collection of his work can be found in Poems
of William Soutar: A New Selection, (ed W.R. Aitken, Scottish Academic Press,
1988). A lively succession of friends, artists and writers came to visit Soutar
in his bedroom. He recorded these events, along with his own thoughts, political
views, dreams and creative processes in his diary, his journal, a dream book,
a common-day book and, at the very end of his life, a record which he called
‘The Diary of a Dying Man.’
All luely, luely cam she in,
And luely lay she doun:
I kent her be hercaller lips
And her breists sae sma’ and roun’.
A’ thru night we spak nae word
Nor sinder’d bane frae bane:
A’ thru the nicht I herd her hert
Gang soundin’ wi’ my ain.
It was about the wakrife hour
And cocks begin to craw
That she smool’d saftly thru the mirk
Afore the day wud dow.
Sae luely, luely cam she in,
Saie luely was she gaen;
And wi’ her a’ my simmer days
Like they had never been.
© 2002 Elena and Yakov Feldman