Of Demolition and Reconstruction: a Comparative Reading of Manx Cultural Revivals

Breesha Maddrell, Centre for Manx Studies, University of Liverpool

Abstract

This paper accesses Manx cultural survival by examining the work of one of the most controversial of Manx cultural figures, Mona Douglas, alongside one of the most well loved, T.E. Brown. It uses the literature in the Isle of Man over the period 1880-1980 as a means of identifying attitudes toward two successive waves of cultural survival and revival. Through a reading of Brown's Prologue to the first series of Fo'c's'le Yarns, 'Spes Altera', "another hope", 1896, and Douglas' 'The Tholtan' – which formed part of her last collection of poetry, Island Magic, published in 1956 – the differing nationalist and revivalist roles of the two authors are revealed.

Keywords

Manx; culture; Manx Gaelic; literature; survival; revival; identity; tholtan