Henderson was very much a part of the ‘folk process’ he championed. For some, this position was problematic and riddled with contradictions, but these were contradictions that Henderson himself embraced. His affinity with the cultural politics of the Italian Marxist Antonio Gramsci is important here. A constant theme in Henderson’s writing, like Gramsci’s, is the role of the intellectual in society. Gramsci famously ‘hated indifference,’ believing that ‘living means taking sides.’ ‘Those who really live’ he wrote, ‘cannot help being a citizen and a partisan.’ In this spirit, Henderson refused to separate his life, scholarship, art and politics – writing, Colin Nicholson, ‘For our own and the others: Hamish Henderson’ in Poem, Purpose and Place: shaping identity in contemporary Scottish verse (Edinburgh: Polygon, 1992) Gibson, Corey (2015). The voice of the people: Hamish Henderson and Scottish cultural politics. Edinburgh. ISBN 978-0-7486-9996-4. OCLC 919188115. In 2005, Rounder Records released a recording of the 1951 Edinburgh People's Festival Ceilidh as part of The Alan Lomax Collection. Henderson had collaborated with the preparations for the release. The Flyting o' Life and Daith by Hamish Henderson". Scottish Poetry Library (in Inglis) . Retrieved 23 Januar 2022.

I would like briefly to reflect on and develop what Jamie McGrigor said. In the school of Scottish studies, Hamish Henderson leaves us with an institution that is a magnet for young people from all over the world. I meet many students at the University of Edinburgh who have come here specifically to visit the school of Scottish studies. Next week, a group of Estonians will visit the Parliament from the school of Scottish studies. They have come specifically to learn about Scottish folk music and to study the collection that Hamish left. Hamish Henderson’s credo was derived from Heinrich Heine’s ‘Poetry becomes People’ — the perfect fusion between folk and art poetry. Gibson is right: with his song ‘The Freedom Come-all-Ye’, written for the Clydeside peace marchers in 1960, he produced the ‘most compelling example of a poetry that “becomes people”.’ So much so, that, despite Henderson’s own rejection of that idea, lots of people would want to see it used as the Scottish national anthem.

Broadcasts

Henderson’s biographer Tim Neat (2010) suggests that his credo ‘Poetry Becomes People’ captures the essence of his beliefs and life’s work. This phrase comes from a poem series called ‘Freedom Becomes People,’ published in 1985, inspired by the German poet Heine: An early two-stanza version of the song was published in a broadsheet "Writers against Aparthied" (sic) in the Spring of 1960; [1] as the first line refers to Harold Macmillan's Wind of Change speech, [2] given in February of that year, the composition can be dated quite precisely. Henderson was recorded singing the complete 3-stanza version of the song that year. [3]

Alec Finlay, editor (1992) Alias MacAlias: Writings on songs, folk and literature, Polygon, Edinburgh ISBN 978-0-74866-042-1 Hamish Henderson referred to himself and the poets of that era as having "grown up for war". His time in the army during the second world war further exposed him not only to the songs of the soldiers but to the new flowering of written poetry in that era. He was intensely proud of being a Scot, but that national pride and an international outlook went hand in hand. He once said:

Regions

University of Edinburgh: Hamish Henderson Archive (includes information about the poet, and details of holdings)