Ronald KSMacaulay Pitzer College September 1990

r!

BELLA THE WELDER AND WORDSMITH

Preliminary version·

·

-~

Ronald K.S.Macaulay Pitzer College September 1990 1

2

Bella K was interviewed in 1984 by an unnamed woman interviewer as part of the Dundee Oral History project. She was born in Dundee on August 29th 1922, the youngest of three with one brother and one sister.

Her father was a baker; her mother

did not work after she got married except for one occasion when Bella was about eight and her father was out of work. Her parents were clearly remarkable people, as will become apparent.

Bella

herself is an extraordinary woman with an exceptional gift for expressing herself.

She had an unusual life, but it is her

ability to tell her story that is what makes her interview a rare example of good sense and eloquence.

The only editing in the

cited examples has been the elimination of some repetitions, false starts, and hesitation fillers such as em or eh.

The

punctuation is intended to make reading easier rather reflect the intonation and pauses on the tape, but in all cases it should be remembered that the punctuation is an interpretation of the transcriber and does not necessarily convey BK's meaning.

For

the most part, words are shown in their normal orthographic form, with only marked examples of Scottish words indicated by traditional spellings. BK's is mainly a story of success but also in some ways one of frustration. The peak of her success was to become a welder in the shipyard during World War II, and then after years of being denied the possibility of using her demonstrated skills, when equality of opportunity for women arrived, she was able to go back to work in the shipyard, although at the last moment she had

3

doubts: I was on the shipyard bus with aw these men, and coming down the brae I'm quite sure some of them were saying to theirsel "What the hell is that woman coming down this brae for?" And I stopped halfway and thought:"Christ, will I turn back?" or "Oh no!

What the hell am I doing here?"

And then

I pulled myself up and I said:"I'm here to prove women have it."

I didn't have to prove myself.

during the war. war experiences."

I had proved myself

"I am now here to reap the benefit of my So in I marched. [p.98]

Summing up at the end of the interview she assesses what she had done: I think for women's equality I threw a pebble in the water. It was a very very small wave, but it was my wave, and I feel I achieved something. [p.ll3] The sense of frustration comes from her feeling of isolation and lack of purpose once she had retired.

She was still interested

in doing something worth while, but she was not sure what to do. Partly through living abroad for so long, partly because she had chosen to work in a predominantly male environment, and partly because of her own individual nature, she had lost contact with her old friends and found it difficult to make friends with women of her own age or with younger women:

.•I

4

so that I find that I'm a sort of a misfit.

Maybe I am.

Maybe I am a misfit, and I just dinna seem to fit in. still-- I'm still looking. to go.

I'm

I'm still searching for a place

I'm still searching for something that I would be

interested in enough to leave my fireside when it's snowing, and go out about it ... [p.lll]

And at one point she expresses her sadness eloquently: When you say to me "Think on a colour,"

I think on grey:

grey ashes in the grate, grey school uniform.

Grey is the

colour, grey's the colour when you havenae got any money.

I

think on grey, grey days, grey rainy weather, grey, things are grey. [p.lll]

But these notes of sadness are rare in the interview, and for the most part BK's story is one of pride in survival and achievement, told with remarkable energy, skill, and humour. Both BK's parents were clearly exceptional.

Her father was

an ardent trade unionist, a teetotaller, and a man of principle. Although he brought up his children as atheists and kept them out of religious instruction at school, BK says "A Christian outlook was very very strong in our family" (p.35). He got up specially to be able to hold discussions with his children when they were eating: Our table was the conversation piece where all the political-- all the news items were analysed, discussed, and

5

oh great discussions. your opinions were.

And you were encouraged to voice what It was very unusual.

[p.l5] He refused to go to his own father's funeral (p.l6) because his father "was a weed", but when he found out that his unmarried daughter was pregnant, he said to her: I've only one thing to say to you.

Have as yet no unkind

thoughts for the child that is not born for it may prove a blessing to mankind. [p.76] As BK pointed out, this was a remarkably tolerant attitude at a time when "there was a lot of stigma" attached to illegitimacy in Scotland. He was less tolerant about reading matter and would not allow the children to read comic books, but encouraged them to read serious works.

Bella herself felt that this was a

mistake, in her case at least.

She might have been more

interested in reading if she had been allowed to follow her interests. BK's mother was always taking in children or adults who had nowhere else to go.

The house was always full, including two

Spanish children who had come to Scotland during the Spanish War: My mother had two bedrooms and the living room. never privacy in our house. strays in bed.

There was

There was always waifs and

There was two double beds in what was my

bedroom, two double beds and a cot.

I think there was two

double beds in every room in our house even in the living

6

room.

There was a bed settee, you know.

They made up for a

bed and a bairn's cot or a pram some place. There was always children in our house, always. [p.24]

Bella's mother was also a musician, and had a group that came to play, but neither Bella nor her sister succeeded in learning the violin.

Perhaps another instrument would have been a better

choice, but Bella's parents were clearly ambitious for their children. What Bella got from them was an independent spirit, a deep sense of compassion, and a remarkable gift for expressing herself vividly and clearly.

From the conversations with her father, she

clearly developed a concern for saying what she meant as clearly as possible.

There is almost no obfuscation in BK's interview,

and an almost unbelievable candor.

She speaks openly about such

embarrassing subjects as bed-wetting, illegitimacy, urination, and the language of the male working place.

There is nothing

crude in her treatment of these subjects because she speaks with a directness that avoids the awkwardness of coyness and reveals no anxiety about talking of intimate matters. Because BK is secure in her attitude regarding these topics, she runs no danger of embarrassing her listener.

It is clear from the tape that the

interviewer was enjoying the experience as much as BK, and the tape itself is a pleasure to follow. From her mother BK probably got a musical ability that manifests itself in the oratorical style of Bella's remarks.

Again and again she produces sequences

7

that deserve to be analyzed as performances, not unlike works of music. The following sections are an attempt to illustrate BK's rhetorical skills, by showing how the effect of an amusing, informative, and moving conversation (Macaulay 1990) is not accidental but the result of the skillful employment of a number of linguistic features.

Whether BK was consciously aware of what

she was doing is not the point; the point is rather that the kind of effects she produces are attributable to certain features that can be analyzed ex post facto.

It is, however, unlikely that BK

was totally unaware of what she was doing.

She clearly enjoys

telling her story, and she tells it as one who knows that she tells it well.

Although she might not describe what she does in

the terms presented here, she probably has some idea of the effectiveness of speaking in the way she does, and may even be employing certain techniques deliberately.

Regardless of BK's

understanding of specific details of what she is doing, the analysis shows that she is a remarkably effective speaker. Such a result does not occur by accident.

The use of repetition As has been frequently noted (e.g., Johnstone 1987; Labov 1972; Ochs 1979; Tannen 1989), repetition is a particularly effective rhetorical device.

Repetition can have many functions,

including reinforcing an image by repeating the same word as in BK's reference to

~

above.

She does the same in describing

8

the association with another colour and her grandmother's death: My grandmother died-- in fact, died before we left that house because I remember-- I can remember they had taxis in Dundee.

They were yellow, and it was a yellow taxi that

took granny away.

So we as children hated yellow taxis,

cause granny never came back. She was taken to hospital Victoria Hospital [and] she died there.

Yes, she was taken

away to Victoria Hospital, but she died there, and we never liked eh yellow cabs after that, as children, you know. [p. 7]

BK uses repetition of lexical items in making lists to reinforce the notion of quantity: That was another thing that was underneath our room bed-it was FULL of musical instruments [laughs]. There was a half-sized fiddle, a three-quarter-sized fiddle, and a fullsized fiddle.

There was a banjo, a G banjo, there was two

banjo mandolines, there was a mandoline and there was a onestringed fiddle. [p.lO] The repetition of the words fiddle, banjo, and mandoline brings out clearly the force of the emphasized phrase "FULL of musical instruments". And it wasnae the Courier we had for a tablecloth. tablecloth.

We had a

My mother was called the rich aunty, because

she had a tablecloth. [p.l8]

9

In a number of places BK points out that they were better off than their neighbours.

Having a tablecloth was one, but they

also had fresh milk, where the others could only afford condensed milk.

Even stronger evidence of affluence was cream at a wedding

reception: it was always a slap up feed, steak pie and tatties, and trifle with real cream, real cream, trifle with real cream, big bowls of it.

[p.17] Repetition can also be used to reinforce less pleasant notions. BK describes how as children they used to search for objects value in the midden or place where the rubbish was thrown: Somebody had threw it oot.

It had been sitting in the

midden, stinking with ashes.

There was ashes, there was

shit, there was babies' shit, there was eat's shit, there was everything in that thing.

Oh boy!

[p.38] It is not only adjectives and nouns that are repeated.

BK

describes the agony of wetting herself as a young child in school: And I can remember sitting in the class, and at Hill Street it was on a slope, so that you had big broad steps.

Every

step was another desk, and I can hear it yet to this day trickling down these steps, trickle, trickle, trickle. [p.40] The repetitions iconically reproduce the scene.

A different kind

10

of iconicism occurs in her account of her father's resistance to comic books: We couldn't bring them home because we went for The Wizard and The Rover, and my father wouldn't allow them in the house.

He was dead against it, dead against it.

"No! No!"

[pp.l4-15] The repetitions suggest that her father probably expressed this view on a number of occasions. Similarly, BK reports her teacher's disappointment when she found out that Bella was not as academically inclined as her sister Lizzie: She thought she had another budding star on her hand, but was mistaken, well mistaken, well mistaken. [p.44] The repetition of mistaken suggests that Bella disappointed her teacher on many occasions. Sometimes the repetition is of examples of a category, as in describing the kinds of reading material that came into their house regularly: There was newspapers came in.

Of course, there was the

usual Telegraph, the Dundee evening paper. There was the Telegraph and there used to be Reynolds news came in. Reynolds News that's a dead out paper. called the Worker's Life. in, lots of pamphlets.

There was a paper

There was trade union papers came

These all come in.

pamphlets lying about some place.

There was always

[p.l5]

11

Sometimes the repetition is of a whole phrase: And it broke his heart and he took to the drink. never put him on the drink.

The birch

The hard life of thieving never

put him on the drink, but this compassion for a fellow man put him on the drink, and he died.

(p.33] There are also repetitions with variation.

BK describes how she

managed not to wet herself at a slightly later age: I never done it during the day, because I was trained up to go according to the clock. school.

You went afore you went to

You went at ten o'clock, at playtime.

twelve o'clock. four o'clock.

You went at three o'clock.

You went at

You went at

There was times that you went to the toilet.

You emptied your bladder by the clock not according to how you felt.

(p.43] The repetitions ten o'clock, twelve o'clock, three o'clock, four o'clock iconically reinforce the notion you emptied your bladder by the clock. BK sums up what she had liked about working as a welder in the shipyard: it suited my personality.

It suited my physique.

It suited

my outlook on life.

(p.86] Working in the shipyard was the kind of work BK found satisfying: "it did great for your ego and great for your sense of

12

achievement.

It took away the drudgery out of the word work.

You were-- all at once you were a creator.-"

The repetition of

the word suited drives home the match between Bella's character and the job. By way of contrast, she describes the boredom of working at a war-time munitions factory and why it didn't suit her: It was nightshift and it was twelve hours, and they were making six pound shells.

And I got put on a saw, sawing up

big long poles of metal into shells.

You know the size of

the shells, and it took about an hour for this ruddy saw to come down and munch its way through this bar of steel. Christ, sit there for twelve hours a day! was full of life. destroying.

I was strong.

It was killing me.

I was young.

I

It-- it was soul So I left that as well.

[p.83]

The repeated pattern of I was young, I was full of life, I was strong brings out the reason that it was soul-destroying. Another example occurs when describing work in the Timex factory: Ours was an eight-hour job.

Eight hours a day the hands

hands hands went the whole time. [p.94]

The repetition of hands suggests the constant movement. Similarly, she speaks of the frustration she felt after the war when she could not get a job as a welder simply because she was a woman:

13

it was a bugbear to me for years and years and years. [pp.92-93] The repetition of years not only suggests length but also monotony. Her account of playing truant for a succession of days is given in terms of the scenery: so I went up the Law Hill, and I've seen the Law Hill in all its glory.

I've seen the river there in all its silences

and its roughness. I've seen the sun going down on it and the sun come up on that River Tay.

All from the days I

played truant ... [pp.48-49] This is a remarkable way of evoking what was in fact a very unhappy and frightening episode in Bella's schooling. Sometimes the repetition has the effect of creating a category: And it's funny how the crowd all divided up, because one did marry a Norwegian.

I married a Dutchman.

married an Englishman.

Somebody else

You know, they all married

different ... [p.54] Here, although "they all married different," the implication is that they all married foreigners, putting the Englishman in the same category as the Norwegian and the Dutchman. When she returned to the shipyard, she was put to work in the construction shed and the man who had been doing that work

14 was sent up to work on the boat, where the other tradesmen teased him: So this man went-- goes away up on the boat, and they bothered the life oot of him:"I telt you it was a lassie's joab you were on. It was a lassie's joab, a lassie was daeing your joab."

And so there was great rivalry between

the different trades:"Och aye, aye, a bloody lassie'd dae that a welder's joab.

It's aw just cissies that's on the

welding" as well, you know.

There was a lot of banter •..

[p.98] The repetitions of lassie's joab suggest both the quantity and monotony of the banter. When she went to Holland, BK found that the role of women was different from what she had known: And I'm afraid when I went to Holland the women in Holland didnae work.

Their value was in being to knit and to sew

and to clean and to be a willing servant to Papa. in from work, and it was:"Get out of that .chair! been earning pennies for us all day. down.

Papa came Papa's

Papa wants to sit

Let Papa have his cup of tea or cup of coffee first."

And then you're standing, the children were standing there, and the light goes out.

"Now off to bed," because Papa's

tired, you see. And when you spoke to the women, it was:"My man said this" and "My man said that". what your bloody man says.

I said:"Never mind

What the hell do you say?"

The reiteration of Papa brings out clearly the extent to which

15

the woman was "a willing servant", and Bella's rejection of "what your bloody man says" expresses her frustration with the situation. Similarly, in talking about the way she had lost contact with people, BK describes the typical pattern for "folk in Dundee: they went to school with that wee lassie and they sat next to that wee lass, and that wee lassie remains their friend aw their life. [p.lll] The repetitions suggest the limited nature of their friendships compared with the wider experience of life BK had had. BK can also use repetition for cumulative comic effect as when she describes her response to a foreman in the shipyard who had complained about a young, newly-married taking time off his work: I says:"Och you're too auld. this place.

What dae you see?

full of holes, a roost.

You're too auld.

You see a corrugated shed

Look what you're working in.

havenae even got a kneeling pad to kneel on. in wet.

Look roond

You

You're lying

You're lying in cats' piss. There's seagulls

shitting on you.

You're aboot blown away with draughts.

There's fumes going up your nose." Now, be-- be honest.

I says:"Now, come on.

Whaur would you rather be?

Would you

rather be lying on your back in this dirty hole or in a warm bed with a bonny young lassie?

Whaur would you be?" [p.l05]

16

BK can also use repetition to make a very serious statement, as in her perceptive, sympathetic description of the plight of married women whose husbands were away during the war; A terrible time for women whose husbands were away, young women, because they wanted to be faithful.

They really did

want to be faithful, but it's a long long time when your man's away, and it's awful wearisome, and oh you get tired of the washing.

Oh you'd get fed up with washing.

You want

something more than washing, than just feeding your weans. So you needed a wee bitty consolation, and they got consolation.

They got consolation.

the dancing.

Of course, they did.

natural. It was a natural instinct. of their human body. was.

They started going to They're human.

They're

It was a natural need

Yes, there was, there was a few, there

I'm not saying all.

I couldn't, you couldn't, you

can't make a broad statement like that.

You can't say all,

but then I don't think they would be very natural women, if they could go for years, and never look at never even look at another man.

Come on, now, be reasonable.

this is the other side of war.

This is--

This is war.

[p.73] It is not only that there are numerous words repeated, e.g., faithful, washing, consolation, and natural, but there are also modifications in the repetitions, women ... young women, they wanted/they really wanted to be faithful, you get tired of the/you'd get fed up with/ you want some thing more than washing,

17

never look at/never even look at which reinforce the effect of the repetitions. The use of repetition in the interview is so pervasive and so effective that it cannot be accidental or attributed to any difficulty BK might have in expressing herself.

On the contrary,

it is a device that she uses for a wide range of rhetorical effects.

She gets one of her most powerful effects by repeated

reference to a very humble household item, when she describes how she had gone to meet her husband-to-be at the station after an absence of eight years: And I'm looking up the platform. looking for a Dutch uniform.

Couldnae see him.

I was

Couldnae see him, and then the

next thing was this navy blue suit spoke to me, you know. He says:"Is that you Bella?"

I never saw his face.

I only

saw-- I only saw a navy blue suit, and he took me in his arms, and I could smell soap, Sunlight Soap, that strong washing soap, you know, and it didnae smell like him.

I

don't know if you know but your smell attracts you to people as well, and it didnae smell like him, this strong Sunlight Soap.

And as the years passed, what was love?

Just soap?

I don't know. [p.56]

Parallelism BK also makes use of effective use if parallel constructions which are similar to repetitions in that a pattern is repeated,

18

as when she is describing her welding test to return to the shipyard: as you weld you're-- you start off with a rod and it goes down and down and down so your arm goes in and in and in. [p.96] Or from the section on married women during the war, quoted above: I couldn't, you couldn't, you can't make a broad statement like that. (p.73] Or when she goes to take her welding test at the shipyard: I could see the wee laddies running here and the wee laddies running there. [p.96] or how her mother passed the time, because her father was a baker and worked on the night shift: she kept herself busy by knitting and sewing and patching and mending.

(p.S] Or in the wedding photograph: You could pick out whit's his side and whit's her side [p.17] Or the construction of the inside of the ship: How they put the wood on, how they put the furniture in, how they made their lounge

(p.85]

19 On Hogmanay, BK's father would take the children out and because he was a teetotaller, he would buy milk: And then we used to come up past the Hill Street Dairy where my father would buy three bottles of milk: three children, three bottles of milk, and we all got a bottle of milk each to carry. [p.20] When BK refuses to blame her pregnancy on the war conditions, she explains that along with her innocence, ignorance, and curiosity, there was "a mixture of feelings": pity for the man perhaps sorry that he was this sailor away fae hame love of the person himself curiosity as to what it would be like [pp.73-74] The similarity between the first and third phrases makes the second and fourth seem more exactly parallel than they because of the expectation set up.

Descriptive details As Tannen 1989 points out the importance of details for conveying a sense of authenticity and immediacy. BK includes many details in her descriptions that effectively convey the point she wishes to make very vividly and economically.

For example, her

mother had not worked after she got married with the exception of a brief period when her husband was out of work:

20

she took a job scrubbing a cinema-- hands and knees, buckets, and scrubbing brushes and a knife to pick off the chewing gum off the floor and in between the seats [p.2] The details bring out the unpleasantness of the work, so that it not surprising that her father soon said:"No, we'd rather starve than see you working like that."

BK does not say that it was a

horrible job or that her mother hated it, but the details convey the message. BK describes the first house she lived in as a child: it's a big long dark lobby with two rooms, one-- one on the left and one on the right [p.4] The adjectives big, long, and dark suggest the impression on a child rather than the way an adult would describe the house. One object she recalled was a teapot: I remember a big shiny teapot we called Jumbo.

It held

eighteen cups of tea. [p.4] She describes an incident when she was in hospital with scarlet fever: Visitors, it was through a window and I can remember my mother [laughs] handing in a chocolate bobbie to us, you know. It was given to the nurse, and she brought it to me this big bobbie made of chocolate and I wanted it. wanted to keep it.

I just

I just wanted the bobbie, the chocolate

21

bobbie, but she took it away and broke it up on a saucer, and I was furious.

I remember being furious.

it broken up that way.

I didnae want

I wanted it whole [laughs] I can

remember. Just these things stay in your mind. [p.6] The recollection that the nurse "broke it up on a saucer" adds the detail that makes it a complete scene rather than a remembered emotion. BK describes a car that ran over a ball their grandmother had given her brother: it was a yellow car with a running board and a liveried chauffeur.

It was yellow with a black roof ... [p. 8]

The colour yellow refers back to the memory cited above about the unhappy association with her grandmother's death, but "yellow with a black roof" suggests that it is not just because of this association that BK remembers it. She describes the arrival of a child who had come to Scotland because of the Spanish Civil War: and here comes this little waif at our door with a coat, a blue checked coat, with her sleeves halfway up her arms. [p.25] The short sleeves bring out the pathos of the "little waif" wearing a handed-down garment that had apparen.tly not been chosen with great care or consideration, perhaps indicating the kind of attention she was receiving generally.

22

In complaining about the cost of her son's appendectomy operation, BK gives an unflattering description of the surgeon's task: a kid's appendix operation, which took ten minutes, because it was just snip, stitch, and out ••. (p.65]

In describing the risk of falling while working on the ship, BK lists the equipment: you had nothing to hold on to, and you've got cable and rods and helmet and gloves and everything with you, and you're doing it with one hand. (p.87]

BK describes how the men would urinate anywhere on the ship rather than waste time during their dinner hour by going to the lavatory.

She remarks that at five to twelve they were all

"standing pissing in the corners": it was a great display of cocks all over the place. (p.88]

In explaining why she perhaps did not have many men make approaches to her, she pointed out: Certainly we werenae the picture of loveliness in a boiler suit and tackety baits and a big leather jeckit and big leather sleeves and a dirty auld hat on your head. (p.89]

She describes the scene when she applied for a job as a welder after the war, simply signing her name with her first initial so

23 that the personnel manager was not expecting a woman to turn up for the interview: the personnel was sitting there agasp, agog, his eyes wide, mouth open, trying to be as if there was nothing had happened, like the same as if a dust tornado hadnae come into his office. [p.92] She turns the comment of the supervisor in the Timex factory into a graphic description of the job: And when the women went up and asked in this Timex to Thompson for recognition as skilled workers, he turned round and said:"I could get chimpanzees to do the job". And really I went on a machine in Timex.

To be successful you would've

had to be a fucking chimpanzee, because the machine was so made that you would've needed at least four-feet-long legs, six-feet-long arms, and a two-feet body. [p.93] When she went back to the shipyard, the word had got around that a woman was coming to try out: they're all expecting this young dolly bird come doon and doon comes this fat grey-haired wifie [p.96] This is also an example of chiasmus, the rhetorical device "in which two segments contain the same two parts wither order reversed" (Tannen 1989:23): X come doon, doon comes Y. (There is another example of chiasmus when BK is describing her child:"And

24

he wasnae growing very well, so we decided he'd better come off the breast and go on to the bottle.

So on to the bottle he

went." [p.SO])

categorizing people BK speaks frankly about herself and her feelings. her characterization of individuals.

This includes

She refers to a teacher she

had disliked and whom she had actually assaulted: She says, this ignorant swine, to me, this Miss Kirk [p.47] It is not only the epithet ignorant swine that conveys her contempt, but also the repeated pejorative this.

Her reference

to the doctor whose sole response on hearing that she was pregnant was to advise to get married is even more violent: And I had said to the doctor-- I remember I could've-could've knifed him, could still knife him to this day, Dr Gibson from Garland Place. [pp.75-76] On the other hand, her characterization of her fellow workers in the shipyard is descriptive rather than condemnatory: this big tough riveters, you know, and sweary baists [i.e.,beasts]. [p.85] Her description of a cousin is economical: If you think on Laurel and Hardy, think on the thin one and you're looking at Thomas.

[p.33]

25

In describing her wayward uncle, however, BK lists some of the characteristics that made him charming before summing up his type: very tall, broad, good looking, dark wavy hair, terrific personality, but what a bugger, what a bugger that was. [p.28]

The description of her mother-in-law is more sympathetic: And the mother had had a hard hard life. it in the woman.

I could recognise

I recognised it in her clothes, her hands,

her way of doing her hair, [the way] that she put out coffee, the way she made her dinner, you know. recognise it in her.

I could

Yes, yes, the woman had a hard life. [p.59]

Her description of herself as not being "the picture of loveliness" quoted above concludes with a rejection of the sterotype of a "dainty feminine woman": So you can't say this dainty feminine woman because I wasn't, but I was every inch feminine, I was every inch woman. (p.90]

Figurative expressions BK uses figurative expressions quite frequently.

Many of

them are commonplace but the fact that she uses them shows that she is not simply concerned with telling her story as briefly and baldly as possible. Other examples are either original or used in an unusual way.

These figurative expressions are one of the

26

ways in which BK elaborates her narrative. The first set are all examples of fixed phrases or relatively dead metaphors: they fell hook line and sinker for Harry, they did, charming, Prince Charming. [p.30] and you fell for them hook line and sinker [p.53] that was where the bread and butter was [p.58] I went as a wee lamb to the slaughter [p.58] I

didn't delve too deeply [p.78]

So Bella packed up her bags and left. [p.85] of course I had a few of them that came sniffing around about [p.89] it really got quite up my bloody nose to see the way that women were handled [p.93] So the two shop stewards came along to see that I got a fair crack of the whip [p.96] I got aw excited then went over the top, you know. as high as a kite.

[p.97]

I was

27

And two or three of them said:"She's got the right end of the stick anyway .... " [p.98] They worked like dogs till twenty-five past at night, and they got handed their books. [p.105] They'd had their own transport and now here they had to take public transport, and they didn't want a public servant. God, no!

By

They wanted a bloody doormat. [p.l06]

I'm away out on a limb [p.lll] However, BK also uses some expressions that are less commonplace. She describes how her mother used to invite a poorer relative or friend to go away with them on holiday, this at a time when those with little money did not go away for holidays: It was a two-sided knife.

It gave her companionship and

gave the other one a holiday

[p.24] "A two-sided knife" sounds like "a double-edged weapon" but instead the intent is clearly positive. Among her hated teachers was a Miss Kiveen, about whom she expressed a fervent hope: There I met Miss Kiveen God damn her.

I hope her soul's

rusting in hell for she made my life a misery. [p.39]

28

"Rusting in hell" somehow seems an appropriate image for a welder to use rather than the more customary "rotting in hell". When BK got a job in the munitions factory making shell cases during the war, she describes the boredom in these terms: and it took about an hour for this ruddy saw to come down and munch its way through this bar of steel. [p.83] "Munch" is a good way to suggest leisurely progress. She tells how at the beginning of the war she and her friends would wave goodbye to the boys they had fallen for "hook line and sinker" and feel broken-hearted: Maybe for a couple of weeks you were so sad and so lonely, but then call o' the wild came in. [p.53] In the section quoted above about the women whose husbands were away during the war, BK stressed how their need for "consolation" was "natural", "it was a natural need of their body".

For the

younger women it so natural that it was the "call o' the wild". When BK finally passed her welding test and got offered a job again in the shipyard, she summed up her attitude in a sporting metaphor: So I thought:"This ball's right at my foot, and I'm going to play it.

I'm going to play this." [p.97]

This is the only reference to football in the interview, but it suggests not only an opportunity but the desire to score success

29

by means of it.

Later she uses a more biblical metaphor:

I am now here to reap the benefit of my war experiences.

(p.98] This metaphor is developed later showing that it came from her father, who despite his insistence on bringing up his children as atheists, provided "a Christian outlook": if I was to sum up, I would say, take something from my father's book, and I would say I need not be missed, if another succeed me to reap down the fields which in spring I have sowed. reaper.

He who ploughs and sows is not missed by the

They are only remembered by what they have done.

(p.ll3] Then she changes the metaphor: And I think for women's equality I threw a pebble in the water.

It was a very very small wave, but it was my wave,

and I feel I achieved something.

(p.ll3] This is Bella's final comment and it makes a fitting conclusion to an eloquent interview.

Understatement Although BK is quite outspoken, there are occasions when she speaks with a restraint that is also very effective, as when she is describing her wild uncle: he'd been in Temperance, in the Temperance Society, and he was determined to be an M.P., but the only M.P. he ever

30

became was a member of pubs, never a member of parliament. And he liked a drappie. [p.28]

"And he liked a drappie" meaning that he drank quite a lot.

She

also makes ironical reference to "the happy medium's" regular encounters with the wife of the chief of police: So Harry was going up there maybe a couple of afternoons in a week and giving her private seances, if you could believe that, private seances in inverted commas. [p.30]

She mentions a friend of the family who was "a true spiritualist" in contrast to Harry: She was a lady, but she was a true spiritualist. She was a true spiritualist.

She believed it, and she knew Harry for

what he was. [p.30]

BK makes it clear that she knew what it was to be poor. Although they had generally been slightly better off than their neighbours, money had always been scarce. complain about this.

But she does not

On the contrary, she usually mentions it

very simply or makes a joke about it, as in her reference to her wedding: We got married on a teapot stand and a ten bob note and an eicht year auld bairn. [p.SS] Even after a wait of eight years they still had no money on which

31

to get married.

She was even poorer in Holland after she was

married: See, here in Dundee the cigarettes at that time was four and ten pence a packet of twenty, and in Holland they were sixpence a packet, and I couldnae afford to buy them. [p.66] But she was scathing about the way the Dutch were ashamed of poverty.

In Dundee people had not been ashamed of poverty

because, particularly during the depression years, "it wasnae a poverty of their own making". In Holland they had Double net curtains on the window so you didnae see the room was empty. [p.61] She compares the Hague with a city the interviewer would know: I could liken it to Edinburgh, what Edinburgh people would be. [p.61] Although BK does not say so explicitly it would be obvious to the hearer that she is talking about hypocrisy, and she goes on to quote "a saying" that they have over there, which she translates into a local one: Where we would say "Fur coat and nae drawers" they would say "Look they're going aboot with a widden ham". [p.62] Instead of a contrast between outer and under garments, the Dutch saying refers to a piece of wood painted to look like a ham.

32

BK can also refer very economically to a lack of money without going into details.

After telling about the kind of

weddings at which there was "always a slap up feed", she remarks: There's many of them didnae have that.

You had to save up

for that. [p.l7] Not everyone had any spare money "to save up". BK also occasionally gives details that remind the hearer of the problems of those with little money: But when I took sick my mother noticed that my breathing was different from the other two so she sent for the doctor again, which cost three and six at that time, mind you. [p. 6]

This was when BK contracted scarlet fever, and her mother had sent for the doctor AGAIN even though it cost three and six (less than 20 pence), which was a tenth of a jute worker's weekly wage at that time. BK also explains how so many people managed to sleep in their house: my father worked on night shift, so they slept, the two women slept in the bedroom with their children at the foot of the bed, and we slept in the big room-- in the kitchen with my mother, girls to the top and boys to the bottom. And my father, he was working, so as we came out, he went in. [p.S] In other words, her father shared a bed with two women, only one

33

of whom he was married to, but they were not in the bed at the same time.

BK says it very simply and without any sense of shame

or self-pity, but it must have made for a very difficult life. She refers to this fleetingly but affectingly when she describes why she went down to the station to meet her husband-to-be, whom she had not seen for eight years: the station was your privacy [p.56] It cannot have been easy to live in such crowded conditions, but BK does not dwell on that.

For the most part, she only mentions

it when explaining how her parents were always ready to take in someone who needed help or a place to stay. On two occasions, BK makes a comic reference to objects so old that their appropriateness is questionable: they even had a toilet down there that was left over from the Romans [p.88] And the equipment that they were using, eighteen hundred and twelve on the Napoleon's retreat from Moscow that was what they were bending the bloody steel on, that antiquated. [p.l05] In the examples that have been given here, BK shows that she can make her point as effectively by understatement as by some of the more flamboyant devices illustrated earlier.

34

Use of sound One of the characteristics of performed narratives (Wolfson 1978) is the occurrence of sound effects.

BK does not use many of

these but there are a few examples.

Two of them occur in

narratives when she hit her teachers: Her head was bent over this register and I lifted up these shoes with all my might and I clunked her over her head "Bang!" [p.48]

And she said:"The nest time you don't pay attention there will be more than hair flying."

And I said:"How right you

are" and I let her have it with my history book right on the back of her head as she walked down the class "Bump!" [pp.49-50]

Fifty years after the events BK is still "involved" (Tannen 1989) in telling about them and the sound effects add to the performance. She explains how when she went to Holland at first she knew no Dutch: It was "yes" and "no" and the rest was "ho ho" [p.66]

She explained that she learned eventually through shopping and wonders what she would have done if there had only been supermarkets where it is not necessary to speak to anyone. She describes the sports week in the village:

35

The little village band went round oompah-oompah all over the place [p.69]

She also imitates the sound of the looms in the mill: And I thought it was a very isolated job-- white faces, same thing day in day out day in, clacketty-clack, no easy noise, clacketty-clack.

And as you went to bed at night, the

noise of the clacking of the shuttles was in your ears, you know.

You went to sleep with this clacketty-clack,

clacketty-clack in your ears and I thought:"Christ, this is not--

I'm going to go batty here. [p.82]

Later she suggests a different noise: And it was out of this shuttle going back and forward "Dum dum dum dum" . [p.92]

But in both cases the noises suggest the repetitive nature of the noise and why she might "go batty" there. Although there are not many examples, they show that when appropriate BK has use such sound effects as part of her narrative style.

Use of quoted dialogue The use of quoted dialogue can serve a variety of purposes in a narrative (Macaulay 1987; Tannen 1989).

BK makes frequent

use of this feature in the interview. One function is for

36 embedded evaluation (Labov 1972:372-73). For example, when BK tells how her mother had taken a job as a cleaner in a cinema (see above), when she got an infected foot her father said that she had to give it up: "No we'd rather starve than see you working like that" [p. 2]

BK gives many indications that her family were poor at times, though when her father was working they were well enough off. Here by quoting her father she reinforces the idea that this kind of work was not suitable for someone such as her mother. When her brother and sister had diphtheria, BK's mother was upset because she saw poorer children who had not caught the disease: she said to the doctor:"Look at these children across the road.

They've no stockings.

dirty. don't?"

They've no footwear.

They're

Why is it my children take these things and they And he had said till her:"The difference Mrs M," he

said, "the difference Mrs M is your children will survive but if these children take it they will die."

So that was

the position that poorer children were in; you didn't get over the sicknesses, you died. [p. 7]

Here the doctor's opinion is given to show that the illnesses contracted in BK's family were not the result .of neglect or poverty.

BK is here defending her mother against possible

criticism for allowing her children to become ill, but she does

37

it by quoting the doctor. Sometimes quoted speech is used because any paraphrase would risk misrepresenting the situation.

A good example is when BK's

father refused to go to his own father's funeral: My father's brothers came up and said:"You've got to go." My father was full of sense and he said:"No, I refuse to go to this man's funeral"-- his father's funeral.

And he

says:"Honour thy father and mother, but dinnae honour them if they're bloody weeds.

And my father was a weed, so I'm

not going to his funeral." [pp.35-36]

Here the difficulty would be in paraphrasing the judgement "my father was a weed".

While, as Tannen (1989) has pointed out,

such reported dialogue may be "constructed" rather than recollected, the grounds for BK's father's refusal would seem less plausible if presented in any paraphrase.

Whatever "a weed"

meant to the speaker or means to the hearer, it has a certain air of authenticity.

However irrational BK's father's position may

be the quoted speech suggests that he held this view strongly and thus his refusal was one of principle rather than pique. Throughout the interview BK presents her father as a man of principle and this is one clear example of his determination to act according to his principles, whatever other people might think. Another example occurs in BK's account of his participation in the General Strike of 1926: He demonstrated during the General Strike and he had his

38 navy blue serge suit and his homburg hat and his watch and chain on.

And they said:"Why is this well-dressed man

leading the demonstration?"

And that was his reply:"Because

I don't want to come down to your level.

I want you up to

mine." [p.l8] A slightly different example comes from New Year's Eve.

As was

pointed out above, BK's father used to take the children out on New Year's Eve (so that his wife to get the house spotlessly clean for the new year, a venerable Scottish tradition), and he would buy milk: And when anybody shouted across the road "Happy New Year to you when it comes. Have you got your bottle in?"

He used

to hold up the bottle of milk and say:"Yeah I've got my bottle in."

It was his bottle of milk. [p.20]

Here the point is in the gentle way in which he handled his teetotalism.

While BK emphasizes that her parents did not drink

alcohol and did not approve of it, they were clearly not doctrinaire about it.

They had a bottle of beer for Uncle Harry

and some sherry and whisky for visitors on New Year's Day. exchange has its ring of authenticity.

This

In Scotland it is

considered unlucky to wish anyone a Happy New Year before the clock has struck twelve on December 31st.

But if one wishes to

be sociable to those one might not see soon after it is quite permissible to wish someone a Happy New Year WHEN IT COMES, thus

39

avoiding the shibboleth of anticipating the hour.

BK's father's

response to the friendly question "Have you got your bottle in?" is not to counter with any criticism of those who drink alcohol, but to show his participation in the event in his own style.

It

is probably hard for those who have grown up in less judgemental societies to grasp the benign, tolerant attitude which this exchange implies.

It is almost as significant as the way in

which he acknowledges the news that his unmarried daughter is pregnant: my mother discovered that I was pregnant in the morning, at teatime when I sat down to tea where father was and put my hand across for the jug for the milk, my father said to me:"You'll be entitled to free milk now."

My mother had

told him, you see, and at night time when we were sitting, and he was reading his Tele he said: "I've only one thing to say to you.

Have as yet no unkind thoughts for the child

that is not born for it may prove a blessing to mankind." Now I think that tells my father, when you take it back, nineteen forty-one and the attitude of people to illegitimacy at that time.

That says a good lot about my

father and my mother. [p.76]

While it is his second remark "have as yet no unkind thoughts" that is particularly memorable and admirable, it is the the earlier remark "You'll be entitled to free milk now" that shows BK's father's tact, understanding, and love.

Instead of ranting

40

or interrogating her, he lets her know in the gentlest possible manner that he has heard the news and that it does not affect his attitude towards her in the least.

Once again, this has to be

seen against the prevailing attitude of condemnation and accusation regarding illegitimacy at that time in Scotland. The way in which BK's mother finds out is another interesting example of the use of dialogue in presenting a scene: I'm a big woman, so I was able to hide it well, and I was six month before my mother said to me:"Is everything all right with you?"

I was aye crabbit in the morning.

healthy like hell.

I was

I bloomed well, and she said: 11 Is there

anything wrong with you?"

And she says:"I've never had any

navy blue knickers off of you for a while."

You see navy

blue knickers-- when you had your periods "Right, I've no had any navy blue knickers off of you for a while." said:"No you won't." I says:"Yes."

And I

And she says:"Are you pregnant?"

She says: 11 How far?"

I says:"Six month."

At that she nearly dropped through the floor. says:"What! Six month!"

And

She

She says:"Good grief, lassie, have

you been till a doctor?" [p.75] Here the important item is BK's mother's query "Have you been till a doctor?"

As with BK's father, there is no interrogation,

accusation, or condemnation. health.

The first concern is about BK's

The contrast is made all the stronger by BK's relation

of her visit to the doctor:

41

I had been to

a doctor,

and I had gone to him under pretext.

I'd said to my mother I had a cold:"I'm going away for a bottle."

And I had said to the doctor-- I remember I

could've-- could've knifed him, could still knife him to this day, Dr Gibson from Garland Place. him.

I'll never forgive

I said to him:"I think I'm pregnant."

He says:"Well,

I think you'd better get married." [pp.75-76] The doctor's unsympathetic voice and attitude present the background against which the behaviour of BK's parents must be judged. BK's mother's tolerance comes out in her attitude towards BK's wetting herself (which turned out to have a physiological cause that was discovered only when she had a hysterectomy at the age of 42): And my mother thought at first-- there was always a rationalisation as regards that "Oh she's got a chill. Been drinking too much at playtime. Perhaps that she's just forgotten to go to the toilet at playtime." about six, six years of age at this time. to go to the toilet."

I think I'd be "She's forgotten

That would be the excuse.

[pp.39-40] These are examples of the kind of dialogue that Tannen (1989) would use to support the notion that all quoted dialogue is "constructed", since clearly BK is not reporting what was said on any single occasion, but rather a composite of remarks made on

42

different occasions.

On the other hand, there is nothing to show

that BK is not remembering actual examples of comments made by her mother.

Whatever the authenticity of the remarks, they

display a tolerant attitude towards what turned out to be a major problem for both BK and her mother. BK also uses quoted speech for dramatic purposes.

One

describes her encounter with "this ignorant swine" Miss Kirk, who was checking that BK had all her gym equipment with although she was excused from gym because she was menstruating. immediately after a seven week vacation period.

The scene is

After a check of

other items Miss Kirk arrives at the final two: And then says she after all this:"And have you got sandshoes I said.

I had my sandals, hard ones, in

my hand too to prove that.

And she said:"Where is your gym

with you?" "Yes,"

tunic?"

Says I:"It's in the washing."

you've been off for seven weeks." mother's been ill."

And she said:"But

I said:"Yes, but my

And she said:"Oh just pure laziness."

Well, I took that to mean that she was meaning my mother was lazy.

Her head was bent over this register and I

lifted up these shoes with all my might and I clunked her over her head "Bang!" [p.48]

Here BK admits that she might have misinterpreted Miss Kirk's remark ("I took that to mean") but she is quite ready to defend her mother against that kind of criticism.

From everything else

BK has said about her mother, it is perfectly clear that laziness

43

was not one of her characteristics, and this helps to explain if not totally excuse BK's action. The second example (with a different teacher) is equally open to different interpretations: I was looking at the book and she had wanted us to look at the board, and I hadn't heard her say:"Eyes to the front." And she creeped up behind me, and just the silence had got to me, just as she lifted up her hand to wallop me across the head and I had turned, and she missed.

It was only the

top of my hair that she hit, so the hair flew all over. And she said:"The next time you don't pay attention there will be more than hair flying."

And I said:"How right you

are" and I let her have it with my history book right on the back of her head as she walked down the class "Bump!" [pp.49-50] BK can also use dialogue to deal with delicate topics that might be embarrassing or disturbing if handled crudely.

For

example, she admits to her curiosity about what her husband had done in the years they were separated: after we had been married and I'd gone through some of his navy luggage, I had discovered one or two wee letters and things like that, you see, but I just said to mysel:"Well, that's before we were married.

What's past is past."

But

curiosity got the better, so I said to him:"Derek what did you do in all the years you were away from me?"

And he

replied:"! did exactly what you did," he says, "and if you

44

didn't do what I did, you're not the girl I thought you were."

(And did you?)

Yes, I suppose I did.

Yeah, why

not? Why not? [p.74]

This follows closely on the section (quoted above) where BK claims that it was "natural" for the young married women whose husbands were away to seek "consolation" because "it was a natural need of their human body".

Here BK is admitting that it

was natural for her and her husband too, and that they did not think anything the less of each other because of it.

In an

interview that is remarkable for its outspokenness in many ways, including taboo expressions, this section shows that BK's directness is not simply because she is incapable of expresing herself with great subtlety and delicacy. BK's other side can be seen in the following extract where she describes how the women used to tease the men who were "bursting for the lavvy" at five to twelve and looking for a place to urinate: it became a game for to wait until they were at-see them come down.

You would

You knew by the way that they were

looking round about them that they were looking for a place, and you would give it--

We used sit and count and say:"One

two three four five six seven eight nine ten. his spaver open.

Yes, he's started.

Then we shouted:"You dirty bugger!"

Yeah he's got

Wait until he starts." And then he'd say:"Oh

Christ, I didnae ken there was weemen here.

What am I going

45

to dae?

Well, I cannae stop now I've started." [pp.88-89]

As BK pointed out; it was a very raw environment and that you had adapt to it.

This extract shows how BK manages to cope with that

environment.

She said that when she went back to the shipyard

later some of the men tried to shock her "but •.. I had wartime experience of it, and they couldnae shock me, I'm afraid they couldnae." She also uses dialogue to describe her moment of triumph when she at last gets an opportunity to apply for a job back in the shipyard: So I got the ticket from them from the buroo from the-- from the job shop, and I marched up to the shipyard, and I put in this request for work. lodgekeeper's face. hen?" joab?"

And I'll never forget the

He says:"Is this a ticket for a job,

I says:"Aye."

He says:"Is it for the cleaner's

I says: "No, no, it's for the welder's joab."

there was a slight pause and cough.

And

"Oh well, eh just just

wait a meenit," see, and he goes away back.

Around comes

the personnel officer. [p.95] It had taken BK many years of frustration and inferior jobs until this moment when she could apply for the kind of work she was qualified to do. "I had had to have a lower standard of living because I wasn't allowed to use the skill that they had given me. It suited them in wartime.

It didn't suit them in peacetime."

J.

46

Now at last she could not be turned down because she was a woman. So she can savour the "slight pause and cough" as the lodgekeeper takes in the situation. She also uses dialogue to illustrate her relationships with the men in the shipyard when she had returned as "this fat greyhaired wifie" to peacetime work.

In order to be able to get on

the bus without having to force her way through the rush of men BK was allowed to leave four minutes earlier, as had been the arrangement during the war.

The men teased her about this:

There was a white line painted, you know, where they werenae allowed to come beyond this line.

They were all kept back,

and through this line I used to march, and they used to say:"Equality!

Back behind the white line!

Equality!" And

I used to say:"But you know, my dear, that's for safety. That's for safety." yourself!"

"But, Christ, you can take care of

I says:"Oh, but it's not done for my safety.

It's done for yours. meddling with me. you.

You see, I'm no frightened of you

They're frightened of me meddling with

What a shock you're going to get!" [p.99]

The men, of course, knew that the reason she was able to get a job in the shipyard was "equality", so they were keen to claim that it ought to work both ways. her answers for them.

But, as BK says, she always had

The scene suggests the way BK was able to

deal with what was still "a raw environment"-- with humour, with spirit, and with a complete lack of defensiveness.

It may have

47

been a very small wave, but it was certainly her own. Conclusion The preceding sections have tried to show that the.success of BK's story is not accidental.

BK by her own admission does

not read a lot, partly because she does not know where to find what will appeal to her: You could say:"Start to read books. Go down to the library. There's thousands of books. book is going to--

Which book do I pick up?

What

I-- I canna be bothered with these books

with love and mist and eh the mill girl marries, the Mills and Boons things disnae appeal to me. disnae appeal to me.

I'm sorry, it just

I like history books but I don't like

the violence in aw the old history books about the rack and what people suffered. enough. rack.

Christ, I've seen people suffer

I've suffered enough myself, withoot going on the I've been on the rack all my bloody life.

But

physical pain and what people suffered during the war, I can't see how reading about that could be a pleasurable activity to me. make me sad.

See, that would make me weep.

It would

When you hear people [talk about] reading they

say:"I read a book about what they did, what the Japanese did to the prisoners of war, and and it was a great book." And I think "How could this give you pleasure? disgust you? Does it no make you sick?" mind works, so that where do I go? What do I do?

Does it no

That's the way my

What book do I pick up?

[p.ll2]

}

48

There is also no indication that she writes much.

Yet in telling

her story to the interviewer she hardly misses a beat.

The

musical metaphor is appropriate because there is a rhythm and melody to BK's tale that the above attempt at dissection does nothing to convey.

I found (and still find) it a moving

experience to listen to the tape and read the transcript.

It is

not only that she has an interesting story to tell, it is that she tells it so well. happen.

Such an effect does not simply just

It takes skill, judgement, and taste to present her

story so effectively and economically.

In rearranging the

transcript to make a more orderly sequence, less dependent on the interviewer's questions, I found that I had to make very few changes and there was very little I felt should be omitted. BK left school at the age of fifteen, and by her own admission was not a diligent student. education.

She received no further

She lived for ten years in Holland, where her ability

to use the language was limited, at least at first.

Yet her

ability to express herself clearly is outstanding.

Elsewhere

(Macaulay 1985, in press) I have shown how effectively ordinary speakers can use language even in the unusual circumstances of a dyadic, tape-recorded interview, but BK's performance seems to me to be exceptional.

The above analysis is merely a first attempt

to understand how she does it.

49 REFERENCES Johnstone, Barbara (ed.) 1987. Perspectives on repetition. Text 7 ( 3) •

Labov, William. 1972. Language in the inner city. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Macaulay, Ronald K.S. 1985. The narrative skills of a Scottish coal miner.

In Focus on: Scotland, ed. by Manfred G6rlach,

101-24. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. ----------------------· 1987. Polyphonic monologues: Quoted direct speech in oral narratives. IRPRA Papers in Pragmatics 1(2) .1-34. ----------------------· 1990. Interviews as conversations. Paper presented at a poster session, International Pragmatics Conference, Barcelona. ----------------------· In press. Locating dialect in discourse: The language of honest men and bonnie lassies in Ayr. New York: Oxford University Press. Ochs, Elinor. 1979.

Planned and unplanned discourse. In

Discourse and syntax, ed. by Talmy Givon, 51-80.

New York:

Academic Press. Tannen, Deborah. 1989. Talking voices: Repetition, dialogue, and imagery in conversational discourse.

Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press. Wolfson, Nessa. 1978. A feature of performed narrative: The conversational historical present. 7.215-37)

Language in Society