★★★★
Debates and conversations about the Scottish language are rife within the media, with more and more young people celebrating it and using it to express themselves. Fraser Scott’s Common Tongue is one of these works. The show centres around Bonnie (Olivia Caw), and her relationship with the Scottish language, starting with her experiences of feeling different to her peers in primary school, right up to studying abroad and returning to her hometown after graduation.
Caw’s acting is brilliant, and she excels at using accents and facial expressions to really bring the individual characters alive. She’s a natural comic, and the play is packed with many laugh-out-loud moments. References to Scottish culture feel familiar, creating an overall sense of warmth throughout the show. A particular highlight is a daydream from her university lectures, where she imagines ripping the Scots poem from the English student and reading it herself. Her brilliant rendition summons Burns himself, and as ‘Scotland the Brave’ plays, her fantasies spiral into absurd delusions, imagining she receives so much acclaim, they make a statue of her. Similar scenes such as a rant about the taboo around certain swear words and a singalong also keep the audience highly entertained.
Despite the hilarity, there are lots of thought-provoking messages. Bonnie grapples with her Scottish identity: in some settings, such as when she is summoned to court, or having dinner with her boyfriend’s parents, her accent is “too harsh”, yet when reading a Burns poem or questioned by her American friends about ‘Auld Lang Syne’, she doesn’t know the meanings, which makes her feel like a fraud. It’s an interesting point that’s bound to resonate with anyone who doesn’t feel “Scottish” enough. She also considers the common stereotype that having a Scottish accent means you’re uneducated, and realises that while she doesn’t want to be judged, she often judges people with English accents as being “posh”.
The theme of class is constant but not overbearing: whether its her primary school peers bragging about their expensive holidays abroad, or her university classmates being heavily supported by their parents while she relies on bursaries, she’s unable to escape it. It demonstrates how big an impact social class still has within society.
Considering how proud she is to be from Scotland, it’s a bit jarring when she returns from America with a slightly snobbish attitude. She feels physically sick at going to a party with people from high school, fearing she will have nothing to talk about with people who haven’t moved out of the small town. Her accent has changed, and she grows distant from her dad, the man who she declared her favourite Scottish person when she was in primary school. Thankfully, a trip to her local pub—a setting familiar to anyone who’s grown up in Scotland—helps her to regain her pride for her hometown.
Equal parts funny and thought-provoking, Common Tongue is perfect for those who are passionate about Scots, and those who love a good piece of working class, political theatre. You’ll leave the theatre feeling proud of your heritage, and inspired to spread the Scots language far and wide.
Common Tongue is touring around Scotland until 18 October.
Words by Ellen Leslie
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