Уолтер Скотттың «Бонни Дюнди» поэмасы және әні

1825 poem and song by Walter Scott

Bonnie Dundee is the title of a poem and a song written by Walter Scott in 1825 in honour of John Graham, 7th Laird of Claverhouse, who was created 1st Viscount Dundee in November 1688, then in 1689 led a Jacobite rising in which he died, becoming a Jacobite hero. The older tune Bonny Dundee adapted by Scott had already been used for several songs appearing under variations of that title and referring to the bonnie town of Dundee rather than to Claverhouse. Scott's song has been used as a regimental march by several Scottish regiments in the British Army, as well as the official Canter for the Royal Horse Artillery.

From 1668 John Graham, the laird of Claverhouse was at the forefront of Royalist repression of the Covenanters, for which he was called "Bluidy Clavers" (Bloody Claverhouse) by his covenanting opponents. In 1688 he was made 1st Viscount of Dundee by James VII of Scotland (James II of England). When William of Orange overturned James in 1688 in what was called the Glorious Revolution, Claverhouse was one of the few Scottish nobles who remained loyal to James. After trying to influence the Convention of Estates of Scotland on James's behalf, at some danger to himself, he led his cavalry out of Edinburgh to carry on the struggle in the field and was killed at the moment of victory in the battle of Killiecrankie (1689). His forces were subsequently defeated at the Battle of Dunkeld. Over a century later he was immortalised in a poem by Walter Scott which was later adapted into a song.

To help Jane identify the tune, Scott gave a few lines from each of three songs for which it had been used. His first quotation is from Jockey's Escape from Dundee; the second is from Scots Callan o' Bonnie Dundee (though a version of these lines also appears in Jockey's Escape); and the third is from John Gay, The Beggar's Opera (1728; Air LVII, The Charge is prepar'd). The transcriptions of the tune for different sets of words vary both in notes and in rhythmic phrasing. The version in The Beggar's Opera differs most widely, with most of the dotted rhythms smoothed out into a regular succession of crotchets. We cannot say whether Scott had any particular variation in mind; he professed to have a good ear for time but little or none for tune. All are in a minor key, and their melancholy and their subtle rhythms will surprise anyone familiar only with the setting now best known. This later setting, with its cheerful major key and cantering rhythm, suits both the spirit of Scott's lines and their metre, and makes an excellent cavalry march. Scott might well have approved: he intended the verses "to be sung a la militaire" and not as the song is in The Beggars Opera. In this tune, too, variations occur in different publications. The origin of this immensely popular tune is uncertain. It makes use of the Lombard rhythm or "Scotch snap", and may owe something to Scottish folk song. It seems first to have been used about 1850 and was associated with the contralto and composer Charlotte Dolby, later Sainton Dolby (1821–85). The sheet music of Bonnie Dundee was published by Boosey & Sons as "sung by Miss Dolby" and (after 1860) "sung by Madame Sainton Dolby", but Boosey credits her only with performing the song and arranging the accompaniment; no composer is named, and Boosey lists the piece as a Scotch Air. However, Bonnie Dundee has been included among Dolby's works. It has been suggested that the melody comes from a piano piece called The Band at a Distance, and that it was Dolby who first combined this tune with Scott's words. A score for piano or harp called The Band at a Distance, by Nicolas Charles Bochsa, was published by Walker & Son c. 1830, but has no resemblance to Bonnie Dundee. In the Scottish Orpheus (1897), Adam Hamilton gives the song as "Composed by Dr E. F. Rimbault. Arranged by Edward Rimbault Dibdin" (p. 52). This attribution has not been confirmed. Edward Francis Rimbault (1816 1876) was a prolific writer of and about music, but his songs are not listed separately in any bibliography. His name sometimes appears as having "arranged" Bonnie Dundee.

Scott's song was parodied by Lewis Carroll in Through the Looking Glass and by Rudyard Kipling in The Jungle Book. William McGonagall praised the town of Dundee in 1878. A 1904 broadside ballad titled The Bailies of Bonnie Dundee parodied Scott's song to raise accusations of corruption by members of Dundee's burgh council.