A flyting is a contest in verse, especially one where two rival poets exchange scurrilous and often ribald insults. As a genre it is very ancient, occurring in many languages. A well known example in Old Norse, for example, is the Lokasenna, where Loki at Aegir’s feast exchanges taunts with each of the other gods in turn, accusing Freya, for instance, of incest with her brother, while in the Old English poem ‘Beowulf’ we have the hero’s exchange of insults with Unferth.

The tradition is also strong in mediaeval Scots, a classic example being ‘The Flyting of Dunbar and Kennedie’, believed to have been composed around 1500, where two rival poets go at it hammer and tongs. Thus Dunbar addresses Kennedie as ‘Skaldit skaitbird and commoun skamelar,/Wanfukkit funling that Natour maid ane yrle’; Kennedie counters with ‘Revin raggit ruke, and full of rebaldrie,/Skitterand scorpioun, scauld in scurrilitie’, and even without a glossary you can probably guess that all this is not very polite. It’s clever stuff, but pretty crude, and in this week’s offering the 20^th century poet Hamish Henderson (1919-2002; see also weeks 212 and 409), a great supporter and interpreter of the folk tradition, adapts the form for more lyrical and reflective purposes as he imagines a dialogue between life and death. Life, you may be pleased to note, gets the last word.

Notes:

lugs                           ears
deef                          deaf
blin                           bleary
maun dwine              must fade
saft                           soft
maet                         food
ilka wean                  each child
crine                         shrivel
keeks                        peeps
dule                          misery
ae galliard hert         one gallant heart
ban                           curse
duddies braw            glad rags
lowp                         leap over
preeson wa’              prison wall
bigg                          build
gar                           make
pest                          plague, disease
syne                         next, thereafter

The Flyting o’ Life and Daith

Quo life, the warld is mine.
The floo’ers and trees, they’re a’ my ain.
I am the day, and the sunshine
Quo life, the warld is mine.

Quo daith, the warld is mine.
Your lugs are deef, your een are blin
Your floo’ers maun dwine in my bitter win’
Quo daith, the warld is mine.

Quo life, the warld is mine.
I hae saft win’s, an’ healin’ rain,
Aipples I hae, an’ breid an’ wine
Quo life, the warld is mine.

Quo daith, the warld is mine.
Whit sterts in dreid, gangs doon in pain
Bairns wantin’ breid are makin’ mane
Quo daith, the warld is mine.

Quo life, the warld is mine.
Your deidly wark, I ken it fine
There’s maet on earth for ilka wean
Quo life, the warld is mine.

Quo daith, the warld is mine.
Your silly sheaves crine in my fire
My worm keeks in your barn and byre
Quo daith, the warld is mine.

Quo life, the warld is mine.
Dule on your een! Ae galliard hert
Can ban tae hell your blackest airt
Quo life, the warld is mine.

Quo daith, the warld is mine.
Your rantin’ hert, in duddies braw,
He winna lowp my preeson wa’
Quo daith, the warld is mine.

Quo life, the warld is mine.
Though ye bigg preesons o’ marble stane
Hert’s luve ye cannae preeson in
Quo life, the world is mine.

Quo daith, the warld is mine.
I hae dug a grave, I hae dug it deep,
For war an’ the pest will gar ye sleep.
Quo daith, the warld is mine.

Quo life, the warld is mine.
An open grave is a furrow syne.
Ye’ll no keep my seed frae fa’in in.
Quo life, the warld is mine.

Hamish Henderson