Queen Hynde

Heroic, radical and at times hilarious, Queen Hynde is Ossian with jokes; but Hogg's epic has serious purposes in mind.

Queen Hynde (1824) is James Hogg''s most ambitious poem. Concelved as an epic, it takes as its starting point the myth of Scottish national origins to be found in James Macpherson''s Ossian poems. However, Hogg''s epic radically modifies the melancholy solemnities and heroic paganism of Macpherson''s Ossianic narratives. Capable of being utterly hilarious, especially when Wicked Wene is on stage, Queen Hynde is Ossian with jokes. In and through its hilarity, however, Hogg''s epic has serious purposes in mind. Its picture of the ancient Scottish past has much in common with stories of King Arthur and Camelot. In addition, Hogg''s poem offers a Christianised version of Macpherson''s heroic myth of the roots of the Scottish nation. St. Columba, a key figure in the conversion of Scotland to Christianity, is one of the central characters in Hogg''s recasting of the Ossianic material; and Queen Hynde aspires to emulate Paradise Lost as a Christian epic. It does so by valorising Columba''s values of love and forgiveness, as they replace the values of an old pagan would of heroic violence.