In life all things change, usually quite
gradually. The cataclysmic upheavals seen in America in 1775 or in France in
1789 were exceptional, though they were matched by the Bolshevik coup in Russia
in 1917 and the election of Hitler’s Nazis in Germany in 1933. The
inevitability of eventual substantial, evolutionary change cannot be avoided, yet
sometimes it goes in an unfavourable direction. After all, Persia, Egypt, Greece,
Rome, Spain and the Ottomans famously declined and fell. I would like to draw
contemporary parallels from modern Russia and from my native Scotland.
Yasmine
Naghdi as Odette/Odile in Swan Lake
A few days ago, I had the delight of attending
with friends a cinema relay from Covent Garden of Tchaikovsky’s celebrated
ballet Swan Lake. The supremely elegant dancing, the ravishing music and
the magical ambiance were entirely Russian. How civilised and moving it all
was! The 19th century and early 20th century saw a
glittering Russian culture embracing giants like Dostoevsky, Tolstoy, Pushkin
and Chekhov; music was graced by Borodin and Mussorgsky. This culture
flourished in exile, with Rachmaninoff and Stravinsky in music and Diaghilev’s Ballet
Russes enchanting the dance. Even under Communism, the cultural flame did not
die with Prokofiev and Shostakovich in music, Eisenstein revolutionizing film, Pasternak
and Solzhenitsyn producing novels of global significance. In all, a wonderful
legacy.
Boris
Pasternak
But look at Russia now, the least regarded nation in the world, abhorred, isolated and despised! Her leaders and their heartless ideology carry a heavy burden of guilt. Under Lenin, Trotsky and Stalin the Russian aristocracy and liberal elements were persecuted and exiled. Prosperous peasants were dispossessed and starved, notably in Ukraine (4m dead in the man-made Holodomor famine of 1933-4), political dissidents were ruthlessly suppressed and executed. WW2 Victory by 1945 made the regime impregnable, even though Stalin died in 1953, and most of his henchmen removed, to be followed in time by the vulgarly ruthless Khrushchev and the imperialistic Brezhnev, who successfully entered the space race and brought a modicum of prosperity to the Russian masses.
Joseph Stalin
Nikita Khrushchev
Relations with the West were uneasy, despite a
brief glimmer of tolerance with Gorbachov, the USSR finally disintegrated,
riven by its own contradictions, ushering in a period of anarchy under Yeltsin.
A strongman and ex-secret policeman, Vladimir Putin, initially steadied the society
and economy from 1999. Tragically he has made bad even worse. A fantasist and a
killer, he mounted an entirely unprovoked attack on the newly independent
Ukraine. The descent to the gutter has been unrelenting, suppression of all
creative art, crude nationalism demanding a recreation of Tsarist Russia, the
worst popular instincts mobilized, opponents murdered, often in the guise of
“accidents, untimely illnesses, and unexplained suicides or defenestrations”.
Many thousand young Russian and Ukrainian soldiers have perished in this wholly
unjustifiable conflict. Currently the tide of war is moving in favour of the
Russians with their huge weight in numbers and their air superiority; but their
entire enterprise is morally bankrupt and will never be forgiven. Russia, with
no doubt millions of her quite innocent citizens, has lost the respect of the
civilised world and will not be re-admitted to the top table in the West, her
dreams of Empire forever shattered.
………………….
The stirring annual Edinburgh
military Tattoo
But what could all this possibly have to do with
Scotland? Well, think about some parallels. Scotland too has a proud cultural legacy.
Edinburgh, dubbed “The Athens of the North” was the centre of the 18th
Century Scottish Enlightenment, a brilliant circle including David Hume, the
empirical philosopher par excellence, Adam Smith, father of modern
economics and Thomas Reid, founder of the Scottish philosophic school of Common-sense.
Do not forget the great biographer James Boswell nor the matchless poet Robert
Burns, painter Allan Ramsay, nor the peerless architect Robert Adam. The 19th
century saw the flourishing of Walter Scott, poet and inventor of the
historical novel, painter Raeburn, florid historian Thomas Carlyle, novelists R
L Stevenson and Conan Doyle, not to mention dramatist J. M. Barrie and
idiosyncratic modern poet Hugh MacDiarmid.. Quite a gathering of talent!
Sir Walter Scott
Politically Scotland was pre--1914 a Liberal
stronghold with prime ministers Lord Rosebery and Henry Campbell-Bannerman but
it soon revolved towards Labour with worthies like Kier Hardie, Ramsay
Macdonald and Arthur Henderson. The Tories held on to their support holding a
majority of Scottish seats in Westminster in Eden’s 1955 administration. Then
Tony Blair’s ministry 1997-2007 had many prominent Scots – Gordon Brown, Derry
Irvine, Robin Cook, Alistair Darling and Donald Dewar, who became the first
First Minister when her devolved Parliament was reconvened (adjourned since
1707!) in 1999. So far, so conventional. Scottishness was not boasted about,
rather it was quietly accepted, and many Scots prospered within the UK.
All this changed with the explosion of the cult
of Nationalism in the early 2000s and the rise of the SNP. Like class war in
Russia, Scottish Independence became an ideology not a mere policy. Previously
Scottish nationalism was a rather forlorn gentlemanly cause, espoused by figures
like Sir Compton Mackenzie and by romantic intellectuals winning the odd
by-election but basically a protest vote. Suddenly it displaced Labour as the
creed of “Weegies and their Wains” (Glaswegians and their Kids) and other working-class
constituencies. The race to the bottom was begun when in 2007 the SNP became
the largest party in the Scottish Assembly and in 2011 it achieved an overall majority,
(69 seats) all under Alex Salmond. The SNP lost the crucial independence referendum
in 2014 and Salmond resigned, to be succeeded by Nicola Sturgeon who was a
well-established First Minister from 2014 to 2023. Her style was fanatically
fixated on Independence, secretive and Anglophobic and she wowed the chip-on-the-shoulder
nationalist mob. She suddenly resigned under a cloud, as police investigation into
the SNP ‘s finances gathered pace. Her successor was Humza Yousaf, Scottish
born and bred, of Pakistani Moslem origins, who was politically less adept, and
who blundered over his alliance with the Leftie Greens. Humza resigned today
facing votes of confidence and persistent ridicule.
It has to be said that the SNP leadership
carries a rather mixed reputation for honesty and good sense. Alex Salmond was
tried and acquitted for sexual misconduct including rape.in 2018. Also, his
regular programme later, on the Russia Today TV Channel, was heavily criticised
– it ceased with the Ukraine invasion. He left the SNP to found the ultra-Nationalist
fantasy party Alba. Nicola Sturgeon dabbled in gender politics, maybe unwisely,
and her reputation was damaged when her husband was charged with embezzlement
of SNP funds. Humza Yousaf has been naïve in some of his dealings, but is presumably
straight, though there is a recent cloud over his brother-in-law in Dundee
about alleged extortion and a fatal defenestration / suicide. Plummeting moral
standards and a ghastly drug-culture are the bane of beautiful Scotland, the
worst in Europe. What a shameful political inheritance!
SMD
29.04.24
Text copyright © Sidney
Donald 2024
