What would these walls say…
A Uist sojourn……
All the phrases which come to
mind in this particular moment, sound
trite and ‘cheesy’ but for once, they are real. As I stand in the doorway of
the tiny thatched cottage called “Taigh Mairi Anndra” in Scottish Gaelic, ( The House of Mary, daughter of Andrew), perched away up on the hill at the
end of rough track in a small glen in South Uist, the Outer Hebrides, I
contemplate the weather battered landscape in front of me. The house behind me,
has walls three feet thick and I wonder what they would say “if they could
talk”. What did they hear? Who did they see? “Breathtaking” in the literal
sense, the wind blows today from the South West and carries with it, clouds of
soft and curiously mild rain. I am used to island life , I live on the even
tinier island of Canna in the Inner Hebrides,
but Uist has a peculiar softness, tinged with rough edges, which Canna
doesn’t possess. Canna is green and verdant with basalt cliffs topped with
heather moors. Uist is hilly moorland, interspersed with lochans ( small lochs) and dotted with sure footed island sheep. I
know the island well, I have been coming here to work and on holiday for many
years.
But this trip is different,
special. I am here as one of the first people to stay in Taigh Mairi Anndra,
since it was renovated as a self catering holiday home. Why is this one
different? There are many such cottages hidden away as secret gems in the Outer
Hebrides, with low doorways, thatched roofs and satellite dishes tucked away on
fences and behind fuel tanks, to be brought down by the first sheep with a
scratchy fleece…
Margaret Fay Shaw
Taigh Mairi Anndra was the home
of two sisters by the names of Peigi and Mairi Macrae. They spent most of their
lives together in this tiny cottage until their deaths in the 1960’s and
70’s. Unremarkable in their birth, they
have left the world with an incredible legacy of Gaelic song and folklore,
myths and stories. Songs and stories, which they recognised as needing to be
preserved for future generations but
were without the means to record these memories and melodies. Until one
New Years Day in 1928 when an ‘exotic’ young American woman happened in on them
in Boisdale House where they were
invited to ‘perform’ Gaelic songs for her. Hailing from Pittsburgh her name was
Margaret Fay Shaw and she had travelled to the Uist in a bid to find ‘the
pristine’ form of Gaelic song, she had once heard sung by song collector
Marjory Kennedy Fraser whilst at school in Helensburgh for a year as a
teenager. Now in her early twenties she wanted to learn the language and the
songs and entranced by a song sung by Mairi Macrae, she asked the sisters to
take her in and teach her their songs. They agreed and she went to stay with
them in this very cottage for almost 6 years, living as a croftswoman ( albeit
with occasional trips to the Lochboisdale hotel for a hot bath and good dinner!
She went onto create a formidable legacy of song and photorgraph – she was one
of the first female photographers of the 20th Century, for us to
enjoy and cherish today. In 1935 she married fellow folklorist John Lorne
Campbell and their joint life’s work is in in Canna House on the Isle of Canna
where I have the privilege of being the archivist for these precious
collections.
This week ses me undertaking
presentations on her work, using her song transcriptions and ohotographs, Johns sound archive
recordings and some of Margaets unpublished papers on various aspects of Gaelic
folklore ‘hunting’.
I have the prividleg of staying
in Taigh Mairi Anndra for the week, which has been beautifully restored to
modern standards. But more important than the central heating or wifi is the
fact that I look out on the same view as Margaret did 90 years ago. These walls
have heard many songs. These walls have heard laughing and tears. These walls
belong to a people long gone but they have left us with something so precious,
it is hard to put it into words.
What will tomorrow bring? The Uist mist currently hangs over the
cottage but theres a glimpse of blue sky in the promise……
What an incredible experience. I can't wait to read more.
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