Kailyard

A late-nineteenth century school of literature that pedaled a romantic view of Scottish rural life. (Kailyard is Scots for cabbage patch.)

Writing in The Times of London, the Scottish Labour politician George Foulkes criticized BBC Scotland for the tone and content of its output, which he called “dismal, frighteningly parochial, and politically partisan” – and “reminiscent of the kailyard.”

“The Cambridge Guide to Literature in English” described the kailyardschool as “books about humble, homespun topics, often written in the vernacular, [that] promoted a sentimental image of small-town life in Scotland and were, briefly, extremely popular.” The school’s most famous exponent was J.M. Barrie, whose kailyard novels, such as “A Window in Thrums” (1889), have been eclipsed by the phenomenon of Peter Pan. Anti-kailyardists, like the novelist George Douglas Brown, dismissed the genre as “sentimental slop.”

Foulke’s criticism of BBC Scotland raised wider issues about the parochialism of local news in a global media environment, and the perpetuation of local stereotypes by regional broadcasters. As he said, “Scotland is more than murders in Glasgow, supposed flying saucers in Bonnybridge, whisky, tartan and seagulls that steal crisp packets from Aberdeen grocers.”