Providence
My Mother and Father moved house recently. In the course of moving their belongings I came across a delapidated Churston Deckle writing paper box filled with old photographs, largely black and white, of close and distant family members. They gifted me the box of photographs and at a later date we will plough through them and attempt to put names and stories to the faces. Further down the line this will help me piece together some family histories/mythologies for my son.
While aimlessly picking through the photographs — pausing to re-attach pieced together memories to some of the faces — a passage from John Buchan's iconoclastic essay on 17th century Scottish history entitled, The making of modern Scotland came to mind:
But it is not so much the absence of a hero we deplore, it is the ordinary man of decent wisdom and intelligible ethics. In the crowd of plotters, bigots, and fanatics we long for the sight of a little common integrity.
The connection is not as random as may at first appear. This passage resonates strikingly for me in so far as the extent to which 'ordinary men of decent wisdom and intelligible ethics' were absent in the 17th century; they were abundant in working class 20th century Scotland. Particularly in the shipyards and schools of the Clydeside. Men like John Maclean, women like Mary Barbour, people like my relations in the photographs from the delapidated box.
In contrast, 21st century Scotland delivers us back to where we began at the door of John Buchan's lament; a perfect cadence.
Providence is a meditation on life lived in post referendum Scotland contextualised within this broader framework of Scottish national histories.
The words 'Providence prepares for its reward', are an epigraphic contraction of a passage in John Buchan's essay reminding us that the historical editorial, or mediated history, is more powerful than history itself.
The image of the boy playing in the open box echoes the box of photographs; symbolising life past, life present, the future. Ultimately serving as an invocation to providence.
References
Buchan, John. (1908) Some Eighteenth Century Byways. Edinburgh and London. William Blackwood & Sons.
Bibliography
Buchan, John. (1908) Some Eighteenth Century Byways. Edinburgh and London. William Blackwood & Sons.
Smout, T.C. (1989) A History of the Scottish people. London. Fontana Press.
Graham, H.Grey. (1937) The Social life of Scotland in the eighteenth century. London. A&C Black Ltd.