Celtic literature, the body of writings composed in Gaelic and the languages derived from it, Scottish Gaelic and Manx, and in Welsh and its sister languages, Breton and Cornish. For writings in English by Irish, Scottish, and Welsh authors, see English literature. French-language works by Breton authors are covered in French literature. The introduction of Celtic into Ireland has not been authoritatively dated, but it cannot be later than the arrival there of the first settlers of the La Tène culture in the 3rd century bc. The language is often described in its earliest form as Goídelic, named after the
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Celtic literature, the body of writings composed in Gaelic and the languages derived from it, Scottish Gaelic and Manx, and in Welsh and its sister languages, Breton and Cornish. For writings in English by Irish, Scottish, and Welsh authors, see English literature. French-language works by Breton
By Alan Riach Professor of Scottish Literature at Glasgow University
ESSAY
Author William Sharp, left, wrote under the pen name Fiona MacLeod. Lady Augusta Gregory wrote versions of Celtic stories akin to those of WB Yeats BY some accounts, 19th-century Gaelic poetry is less impressive than that of the preceding century, yet on the evidence of Donald E Meek’s anthology of poems from that era, Caran an t-Saoghail/The Wiles of the World, it is rich and intricately connected with the processes of industrialisation, colonialism and imperial expansion, and thus also with what was happening in contemporary Scottish literature in English and Scots. Gaelic is essential to the national story.