Most countries have their own Christmas traditions. Here, Christopher Norris tells us about the Icelandic tradition of Jólabókaflóðið, a tradition book lovers from across the world should surely adopt at this time of year.

 

 

Christmas is a time for giving, all over the world, often featuring a mash-up of custom with origins in different countries. People in many cultures celebrate by exchanging presents with family and friends, and these gifts often include books. Scotland and Iceland share many national traits, including genetic heritage (60% of Icelandic women are of Scots’ descent) and a common love of literature and the sharing of books at Christmas. A Book Week Scotland poll conducted in November 2017 found that a whopping 69% of Scots said they would purchase books or book tokens to give to family and friends at Christmas.

In one sense, this is no surprise: books always make for great presents. Books are cheap, portable and easy to wrap; they come ready to use (no batteries needed); they come in all shapes, sizes, genres and flavours, to suit everyone’s interests and enthusiasms; they can teach, entertain and expand our imaginations; they are robust, stack easily, and have no breakable moving parts; you can never have too many of them and they can last a lifetime. Books have features that can knock more expensive, faddish and exotic gifts into a cocked hat.

There are plenty of books to choose from, not least by Scottish authors or about topics of interest to Scots. In 2017, the International Publishers Association released a report showing that the UK published more books per head than anywhere else in the world (2,710 titles per million people, in 2015). Iceland was not far behind, with 2,628 titles per million, but the Nordic nation has the most well read citizens anywhere on the planet: half the population reads more than eight books per year. Amazingly, one in ten people in Iceland writes a published book, making sense of the national proverb ‘everyone has a book in their stomach’.

Scotland and Icelands’ shared love of books is no accident. Both nations have rich oral traditions, with storytellers entertaining and teaching their audiences on long winter nights; and complementary literary cultures, ranging from sagas of the exploits of medieval kings, through epic poetry, to our modern flourish of tales to suit every taste – including a mutual passion for crime fiction, perhaps a reflection of common cultural roots. Scottish giants of the genre, such as Ian Rankin and Val McDermid, are matched by the talents of Yrsa Sigurðardóttir and Ragnar Jónasson, both best-selling Icelandic authors with many titles translated into English. As a result of this common cultural heritage, UNESCO have designated both Edinburgh and Reykjavík as ‘Cities of Literature’.

In a November 2017 press release from Literature Alliance Scotland, Kristín Viðarsdóttir, Head of International Cooperation at Reykjavík City of Literature, said: ‘Our literatures have crossed paths through the ages as have our people and our languages. We can trace our connection to the very settlement of Iceland, as many of our ancestors came here from the British Isles.’

For over 70 years, Icelanders have celebrated their passion for books with a unique tradition called Jólabókaflóðið – Christmas book flood, in English, and pronounced Jola-boka-flod (with the ‘J’ sounding like the ‘Y’ in ‘yoghurt). The word Jól is Old Norse for ‘Yule’, which is same as the Scots language word for the festive season.

The Jólabókaflóðið tradition began during World War II once Iceland had gained its independence from Denmark in 1944. Paper was one of the few commodities not rationed during the war, so Icelanders shared their love of books even more as other types of gifts were in short supply. This increase in giving books as presents reinforced Iceland’s culture as a nation of bookaholics.

Every year since, the Icelandic book trade has published a printed catalogue – called Bókatíðindi (‘Book Bulletin’, in English) – that is sent to every household in the country in mid-November during the Reykjavik Book Fair. People use the catalogue to order books to give friends and family for Christmas.

During the festive season, gifts are opened on 24 December and, by tradition, everyone reads the books they have been given straight away, often while drinking hot chocolate or alcohol-free Christmas ale called jólabland.

Whilst it might be a stretch to persuade everyone in Scotland to forgo the pub or Midnight Mass on Christmas Eve – especially in a land where a post-Reformation ban on celebrating the festive season led to Christmas Day only being declared a public holiday in 1958 – Jólabókaflóðið reminds us that the long hours of seasonal ennui when ‘there’s nothing on the telly’, we’re fed up of being cooped up with our extended families, and we’re bloated from all the endless turkey dinners, give us the perfect opportunity to find the time and place to lose ourselves in a book, especially one we have just received as a gift. We might even enjoy the experience so much that we would make a resolution to carry on reading for pleasure well into the New Year, once the Hogmanay parties, processions and renditions of ‘Auld Lang Syne’ have died away.

In the old days of Celtic Druids, the Yule season – with its remnant tradition of burning logs to conquer midwinter darkness – lasted 12 days, the period during which they believed the sun stood still, a tradition assimilated by later Viking settlers. The twelve days of Christmas and Twelfth Night remain with us from these origins, as well as the large ceremonial fires lit in northern harbour towns in Scotland to mark the turning of the year.

In Iceland, the modern festive Jól season lasts the full 12 days, personalised by Christmas folklore tales of the mischievous ‘Yule Lads’ and the ‘Christmas Cat’ – captured in a famous poem by Jóhannes úr Kötlum, later set to music by the pop icon, Björk (YouTube video).

Wouldn’t it be great to allow ourselves the chance to read for pleasure over the whole Yule season, from Christmas Eve to Epiphany and beyond? As for me, my festive wish list for Jolabokaflod from the Books from Scotland catalogue (fiction | non-fiction) will include Lethal White, the latest Robert Galbraith ‘Strike’ novel; Alexander McCall Smith’s personal curation of Scottish poems, A Gathering; and a new illustrated biography of the Scottish-born scientist, inventor and engineer, Alexander Graham Bell.

As another famous Scot – Kenneth Grahame – wrote for his character, Toad, to say in The Wind in the Willows, reading books allow you to be ‘Here today, up and off to somewhere else tomorrow! Travel, change, interest, excitement! The whole world before you, and a horizon that’s always changing!’

Let’s make Jólabókaflóðið part of our festive cultural tradition here in Scotland. Merry Christmas and ‘happy reading’, wherever you travel in your books this Yuletide.

 

Christopher Norris is the Founder and Curator of Jolabokaflod CIC, a not-for-profit enterprise to introduce the Icelandic tradition of Jolabokaflod to the UK and beyond: @Jolabokaflod | #Jolabokaflod

With thanks to AUTHOR Interiors for the photograph, taken from The Art of Coorie: How to Live Happy the Scottish Way by Gabriella Bennett

BooksfromScotland is carrying on our #BookWeekScotland celebrations and continuing to look at Scotland’s Rebel women. Rosemary Goring has just released Scotland: Her Story, The Nation’s History by the Women Who Lived It, a brilliant collection of letters, autobiography and other first hand accounts telling Scotland’s story from our women’s perspectives. There are brillliant stories from queens, countesses, miners, mothers and musicians that will enlighten and inspire all readers. Every film producer in the land should probably get themselves a copy! Here, our two women, Madeleine Smith and Mary Brooksbank, find themselves in court for very different reasons . . .

 

Extracts taken from Scotland: Her Story, The Nation’s History by the Women Who Lived It
By Rosemary Goring
Published by Birlinn

 

Letter to a doomed youth

Madeleine Smith, 3 July 1856

Written eight months before she is thought to have poisoned him, this letter from the middle-class Glaswegian Madeleine Smith to her lover Pierre Emile L’Angelier, an apprentice gardener, shows her excitable, dramatic and possibly erratic personality. When she became engaged to a wealthy suitor, William Harper Monnich, thereby crushing Emile’s long-held expectations, she asked him to return her letters. Knowing they were incriminating, he tried to blackmail her into marrying him. All her pleading would not budge him, and not long afterwards, he was found dead. Madeleine’s letters, discovered in the dead man’s room, and her purchase of arsenic in the weeks before his death, led

to her trial in 1857. It caused a sensation. Many refused to believe a well-brought-up young woman could have killed a man in such a sinister and premeditated fashion. Others were transfixed by the scandalous revelations of premarital sex. The charges were found not proven, that peculiarly Scottish verdict which lies between Guilty and Not Guilty. Smith went on to marry twice, have two children, and live a quiet life in England and New York until her death in 1928.

 

Helensburgh
Wednesday Night

My own ever beloved Emile

I trust to Heaven you got home safe – I was not heard by anyone – So I am safe – Were you dearest any the worse of being out in the night air – Emile perhaps I did wrong in taking you into my room – but are you not my own husband – It can be no sin dearest – But I wont do it again – I was so glad to see you darling – would I could be ever with you to keep you company – You stayed so short I got nothing said to you – I had thought of so many things to ask you about – But I hope love your next visit will be longer – Emile my husband I have been thinking of all you said to me last night – Now in the first place – I promise you I shall safe as much of my pin money as I can – I shall put it to many useful things – I shall spend the money I safe on things I shall require when I am your wife. Will this please you – In the second place – I shall not go about as of old with B/- I shall go out before the afternoon – And in the next place – I shall not go to any Public Balls without getting your consent – will this please you my dear little husband – I shall try and do all I can to please you and keep your mind free and do be happy – And darling if you continue to love me I shall please you in many things – Emile if you go away and go into the French army – you know you will never return to Scotland – and of course I am your wife and I can never be the wife of any other one – So my mind is made up if you go – I shall go where no one shall see me more – I shall be dead to the World. But dearest love I trust we shall get on so that you wont go. I shall behave well for your dear sake – Yes My own My sweet Emile I shall make you happy. You shall some day I hope say you have a faithful and loving wife, And my prayer shall be that you shall never regret taking me for your wife – One of my annoyances is that I may not suit you – or that I am not half good enough to be your wife – Emile I often think we do not [know] each other much that is – we do not know the temper or character of each other – We have never seen each other but under peculiar circumstances so we shall have all that to study after our marriage. But I dont think dear love it shall be difficult to do – What do you say pet . . .

I shall now say Good Night – It is later than when you left me last night – Adieu my love my good dear husband – I adore you more and more each time I see you – You were looking in my eyes very very well last night – I forgot to tell you last night that I have had great pain in getting my first Wisdom tooth. So after I get them all you will expect something like wisdom from me. Adium sweet love my fond embrace – A dear sweet Kiss from your devoted and your truly loving your affectionate wife your own dearest true

Mini

 

A marked woman

Mary Brooksbank, c. 1922 or 1923

 Born in Aberdeen in 1897, in what she described as ‘one of the worst slums in the city’, Mary Brooksbank (nee Soutar) became a fervent Communist, and served three sentences in prison as a result. This was something of a family tradition, her father being an ardent trade unionist. She was also a gifted songwriter, best known for ‘Oh, Dear Me’ (putting the words to the tune of ‘The Jute Mill Song’). After her family moved south, she started in a jute mill in Dundee when she was almost fourteen, and for the rest of her life agitated for better conditions for workers. In an interview with Hamish Henderson in 1968 she recalled: ‘My mother put me into service for a period; tried to make me genteel you know. She gave me a lovely outfit but it didna suit me; it was the worst thing she could have did because I saw right away the contrast between their homes and ours, you know, thon’s o’ the gentry and ours.’ She was expelled from the Communist Party after expressing her condemnation of Stalin’s inhumane policies. Michael Marra and Rod Paterson wrote a song in her honour, called ‘The Bawbee Birlin’. Here, she describes life in a mill shortly after the First World War.

 

The life of the women workers of Dundee, right up to the thirties, was, to put it bluntly, a living hell of hard work and poverty. It was a common sight to see women, after a long 10-hour day in the mill, running to the steam washhouses with the family washing. They worked up to the last few days before having their bairns . . . Infant and maternal mortality in Dundee was the highest in the country, worse even than Lancashire. Children of 12 were given badges enabling them to sell papers in the street. Even the police had their Bootless Bairns Fund, for bootless bairns were a common enough sight in those days. So were low wages, unemployment, profiteering in food, lack of proper medical attention, bad housing conditions, and, of course, the ever-prevalent ignorance, superstition and fear.

The women in particular had much to be afraid of. Fear of losing their jobs, fear of losing their health, fear of losing their bairns, fear of offending, even unwittingly, gaffers, priests, factors, and all those whom they had been taught were placed by God in authority over them.

Unemployment continued to grow. How could it be otherwise? The imposition of the Versailles Treaty on a defeated Germany virtually made slaves of the German people, compelling them to produce the goods which we had formerly made. The British and American industrialists reaped a rich harvest by way of reparations but had to subsidise their own unemployed wage slaves. In the meantime, mass demonstrations were taking place. One in particular comes to mind. It was during the first Armistice Day, that day when two minutes’ silence is held in memory of our ‘glorious dead’. Yes, ‘these bundles of bloody rags’, mentioned by Churchill. With our banners of protest mentioning the numbers of unemployed, the homeless, the widowed and orphaned, we marched. One of our unemployed ex-servicemen had a banner depicting a soldier rising, looking up at these numbers, and saying, ‘If this is what I fought for, thank Christ I’m dead!’

A local minister, the Rev. Harcourt Davidson (noted for his drinking habits), stopped our demonstration, then the police, who had been waiting, commenced arresting our leaders. We were charged with breach of the peace. I got 40 days’ imprisonment, Jock Thomson, our chairman, got 60 days, and some 20 others got fines and lesser sentences. Every day we spent in gaol there were mass demonstrations outside. We could hear the people singing and shouting to cheer us up . . .

I was soon to learn that original thinking, like original sin, brought its own punishment. I found that, because of my activities, I could not get a job, and if I did, I could not keep it long.

I recall a great rally held in the Caird Hall, and sponsored by all the religious denominations in the city, against Bolshevism. One of the posters, a gigantic affair, showed a worker being led blindfold into a chasm. Over the brink was a black cloud labelled ‘Communism’. Evidently plenty of money was behind this political rally, for there was no mistaking its purpose, hidden under the cloak of religion. No sooner did the chairman start to speak than there were interruptions from all over the hall. During a lull, I asked the chairman why the reverend gentlemen had made no protest at the mass slaughter between 1914 and 1918? I was immediately seized and hustled out to a waiting van.

Next day in court I pleaded guilty. The sheriff, Malcolm, asked why I had protested the previous evening. I pointed out that this had been advertised as a religious meeting, but was in fact political. He agreed, saying, ‘International politics, Mrs Brooksbank!’ He then fined me three guineas.

I soon realised that I was becoming a ‘marked’ woman. Once, while addressing a meeting outside the High School gate, in answer to a question I said that until the working class took possession of the –— means of production and became rulers of the country, we would always have unemployment, so long as we had production for profit. That night I was taken from my home by the police and kept in custody without being informed with what I was being charged.

Our organisation got a solicitor, a young man called Carmichael, a partner of Grafton Lawson. Next day I was told that I was charged with sedition. I was taken downstairs into a room where a sheriff’s clerk read a long rigmarole. Then I was taken into court. Carmichael came over and in a very paternal tone of voice asked me to plead guilty. He told me that it would go hard with me if I didn’t, as sedition was a very serious offence.

He said he was sorry to see me mixed up with all these riff-raff, I was very young, etc., etc. I asked him if he was being paid to represent me, or my accusers, whereupon he became very annoyed. When the Court proceedings opened, I promptly pleaded ‘Not Guilty!’ Carmichael addressed the sheriff, saying that this young woman had received a poor education and did not realise the seriousness of what she was saying. I interrupted, asking if I could enter the witness box. The sheriff replied, ‘Certainly’.

I said I admitted that what I said was only what a former Labour Prime Minister had once said, but in different terms. I protested that I was not asking the 500 or so people at the meeting to take over the administration of the country. Came the verdict: ‘Not Proven!’

 

Scotland: Her Story, The Nation’s History by the Women Who Lived It by Rosemary Goring is published by Birlinn, priced £20.00

This week is #BookWeekScotland, and this year’s theme is REBEL. We’ve already uploaded our Rebel issue, which you can read here. And all this week, BooksfromScotland will be highlighting even more Scottish books with a bit o’ rebel in ’em! Let’s kick of with some poetry, and Gerda Stevenson’s brilliant collection, Quines.

 

Poems taken from Quines: Poems in Tribute to Women of Scotland
By Gerda Stevenson
Published by Luath Press

 

The Dwaum

Isabella MacDuff, Countess of Buchan, 1286–c.1313, Fife; in defiance of her husband, she crowned Robert the Bruce as King of Scots at Scone in 1306, during the Wars of Scottish Independence;
captured by Edward I of England, and imprisoned for four years in a cage hung on the walls of Berwick Castle.

1

Strange, the wey ye get yaised tae a thing –
the wund whuppin its braith through the baurs,
sun slingin its spears, hail hurlin its flanes,
year ower year. I dinna feel the cauld ony mair
in ma tatterwallop goon; the day, I sweir
I hae a norrie that ma limbs are growin hair,
saft, lik the down o a doo – mibbe I’ll hae wings
by morn, an flichter awa…

2

Aftentimes I dwaum, aye the samin dwaum:
I’m layin my hauns on the saucrit Stane
tae gaither its pooer, layin them, again an again,
Comyn’s stowen meir on the cobbles ootby,
her braith a reek in the nicht, she’s champin at the bit.
Syne we’re heidit North fae Lunnon Toon,
her hooves dirlin ablow an eldritch mune.

It’s dawin fair whan we win the Border,
tho by Scone, we’re droukit wi dounfaw an swelt;
an he’s there, pacin the palace grun – furrit an back,
back an furrit – Bruce, waitin fur ma hauns alane.

The dwaum, the dwaum, the samin dwaum,
I lay my luif, first ane then t’ither, on the saucrit Stane,
oor braw Stane that Edward daured tae rieve;
ma clan alane can croon oor nation’s king.
I hae the pooer; on his pow I place the gowden ring.

3

Cages are lang-kent tae me;
lang, lang afore noo, fae the day
I ettled tae flee the bield, a lowp
in ma spang, howp in ma hert,
a hale rowth o time aheid o me;
but claucht an hapshackled
in a union biled in hell, aa wrang,
a line leal tae Edward, thirled
tae yon auld Comyn carl, agin ma will.

He hoasts an he hirples,
The weary day lang,
Maids, when ye’re young,
Niver wed an auld man…

I hae a hoast in ma lungs the day –
berkin like a dug – an unco hirple an aa,
sae I’m telt by yon wumman wha casts
the brock tae me – cauld kail an parritch
that maks ma kyte bowk.

4

A skimmer o licht on the waves ablow.
Scotland tae the North, England tae the Sooth.
The samin mune abuin us aa, that hus nae care
fur stane or nation, croon or king. I’m hingin heich
amang the sterns; am I dwaumin? The baurs
o ma cavie hae fell awa, the down on ma limbs
gies a fissle, a reeshle, ma feathers prick,
ma wings are spreid oot wide, they lift me,
slaw and strang intae the glisterin nicht.

 

Scotland Celebrates 3-0 at Easter Road

Ethel Hay (goal), Bella Osborne and Georgina Wright (backs), Rose Rayman and Isa Stevenson (half-backs), Emma Wright, Louise Cole, Lily St Clair, Maud Riweford, Carrie Balliol, and Minnie Brymner (forwards), wearing nickerbockers in the style of the Rational Dress movement, played and won the first recorded women’s international football match, Scotland v England, Saturday, 7th May, 1881, Easter Road, Edinburgh.

The wind was against us – but wasn’t it ever?
We had all to play for, and nothing to lose;
we kicked off with gusto, no matter the weather,
two thousand, the crowd, their jeers couldn’t bruise
our spirits; red stockings and belts a kindling flicker
across the turf, then flashes of fire, flames fanned
by self-belief, we were bonded as one, slicker
than our English sisters, that day; we spanned
the field, every inch covered, Ethel hardly required
in goal – but when her moment came, oh, the spring
in her fearless lunge to save – the whole team fired!
We surge forward, and hear someone sing,
a lone voice, at first, Daughters of Freedom Arise,
then more and more: Yield not the battle till ye have won! –
our striker takes possession, her mind on the prize,
Lily St Clair, talk about flair! – a meteor cast from the sun –
dancing and dodging, she blazes to the box, and bends
the ball in – a goal for Scotland! We weep and cheer,
Scotia’s Eleven makes history, sends
a message to the world: have no doubt, we are here,
scaling the heights, new horizons in our sights
and the ball is rolling for women’s rights.

 

The Living Mountain Addresses a £5 Banknote

Nan Shepherd, born Peterculter, 1893, died Aberdeen, 1981; novelist, poet and writer of non-fiction, lecturer in English at Aberdeen College of Education; her non-fiction work, The Living Mountain, written in 1941 but not published till 1977, describes the Cairngorms; first woman to appear on a Royal Bank of Scotland banknote, 2016.

You cavorted through my corries, capered about my braes,
careened between my coiling clouds, played
hide-and-seek on my plateau, glinted as you skipped
across my ruffled secret loch – a butterfly, I thought –
a Silver-studded Blue brought back from extinction;
till the wind dropped, and you came to rest,
snagged in moss campion – a plastic rectangle
pulsing on the tail of a breeze.

I dislike litter, especially your kind – polymer particles
that issue in blizzards from careless markets, slip
from pockets, won’t perish in rain or melt with snow;
though in your case, I’ll make an exception, because
you bear her face: the woman who never rushed
to my summits, but walked into me, took time to learn
my every line – schist, gneiss and granite – and heard
my braided voice. You’ve brought her to light again,
all I contain, nurture and sustain, held in her steady gaze.

 

Quines: Poems in Tribute to Women of Scotland by Gerda Stevenson is published by Luath Press, priced £9.99
https://www.luath.co.uk/poetry/quines-poems-in-tribute-to-women-of-scotland

Today we celebrate RLS Day! Each year on this day, literary Edinburgh pays homage to one of its most beloved sons with walks, talks and a whole host of other events that highlights his life and work. BooksfromScotland is happy to get in on the action, presenting this extract from a brand new study of Robert Louis Stevenson and one of his most famous novels.

 

Extract taken from The Scenery of Dreams: The True Story of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Kidnapped
By Lachlan Munro
Published by Deveron Press

 

There are few more beloved authors than Robert Louis Stevenson, both icon and enigma. There are few authors more instantly recognisable, but as the biographies pile up, the more elusive he becomes—puritan and sensualist, introvert and exhibitionist, aesthete and vagabond, invalid and adventurer—he retains a fascination that only increases with the passing years. Essayist, poet, and novelist, his autobiography is his work, and none better I think to glimpse this man-child than his meandering, dislocated, truncated masterpiece, his own personal favourite, Kidnapped. Loved by generations of readers, its popularity has barely waned, for it has all the ingredients of a great yarn: an inheritance denied, good versus evil, an adventure at sea, a swashbuckling hero, a shipwreck, an unsolved murder, a hazardous escape, then, a final redemption – of sorts.

I call his works autobiographical because the themes and characters in nearly all of Stevenson’s writings are derived from his experiences, and despite a vivid imagination, an examination of his poems and stories reveals that nearly all of the characters and incidents recur elsewhere in one form or another. He seemed incapable of writing anything that did not refer to some aspect of his early life, directly or indirectly incorporating memories, dreams, places, emotions, and the traumas of his early years, which he described thus:

 

My childhood was a very mixed experience, full of fever, nightmare, insomnia, painful days and interminable nights; and I can speak with less authority of Gardens than that of that other ‘land of counterpane.’ But to what end should we renew these sorrows? The sufferings of life may be handled by the very greatest in their hours of insight; it is of its pleasures that our common poems should be formed; these are the experiences that we should seek to recall or to provoke; and I say with Thoreau, ‘What right have I to complain, who have not ceased to wonder?
RLS, Letter to William Archer, 29^th of March 1885.

 

But his sickly, cosseted, fear-filled frailty was also full of love and song from his mother, and particularly from his nurse ‘Cummy,’ who peppered his daydreams with stirring tales of religion, war, and witchcraft. These, combined with his extensive reading, and later his travels, would be the stuff from which he would draw inspiration again and again until his untimely death. In his essay The Foreigner at Home (1882) Stevenson wrote:

 

. . . the sense of the nature of his country and his country’s history gradually growing in the child’s mind from story and from observation. A Scottish child hears much of shipwreck, out-lying skerries, pitiless breakers, and great sea-lights, much of heathery mountains, wild clans and hunted Covenanters.

 

But, if his infant life was filled with adventurous imaginings, games, and escapes from his imprisoning bed, he also managed to escape growing up – his great escape, facilitated by a fragile constitution and family money, for attempts to become an artist are invariably at someone else’s expense. He escaped Victorian Edinburgh’s “blunderbuss conformity,” first by adopting a bohemian manner, developing intimate friendships, and secretly frequenting the city’s low dens, then by his foreign travels for health reasons, which he often played up. He escaped following the family tradition of becoming an engineer, and despite his Law degree, he escaped becoming a lawyer. His luminous, translucent, angular androgyny could make men fall in love with him, but he was attractive, and attracted to, older women, who could mother him, and these defined all his adult relationships. Finally, financially independent for the moment, he escaped to the other side of the world to what he hoped would be a tropical idyll. His most constant escape from reality and adulthood, however, remained his imagination, and his attempts to re-conjure his childhood in his writings. In 1884 he wrote to the poet William Cosmo Monkhouse:

 

After all your boyhood aspirations and youth’s immortal daydreams, you are condemned to sit down, grossly draw in your chair to the fat board, and be a beastly Burgess till you die. Can it be? Is there not some escape, some furlough from the Moral Law, some holiday jaunt contrivable into a Better Land? Shall we never shed blood? This prospect is too grey . . . To confess plainly, I had intended to spend my life (or any leisure I might have from Piracy upon the high seas) as the leader of a great horde of irregular cavalry, devastating whole valleys. I can still, looking back, see myself in many favourite attitudes; signaling for a boat from my pirate ship with a pocket handkerchief, I at the jetty and one or two of my bold blades keeping the crowd at bay; or else turning in the saddle to look back at my whole command (some five thousand strong) following me at the hand-gallop up the road out of the burning valley: this last by moonlight.

 

Stevenson would later dismiss this as: “an astonishing gush of nonsense,” but it is just too full of peculiar detail not to be true, and it was his attempts to recapture his vivid memories, and to consolidate his youth, that so much of his work was directly or indirectly concerned. David Daiches wrote that Stevenson, like Proust, was engaged in a ‘recherche du temps perdu,’ a recapturing of lost youth, an escape back to childhood:

 

Literature for him was but an extension of those childhood games of romantic make-believe that he has described so vividly in his autobiographical essays.
David Daiches ~ Robert Louis Stevenson: A Revaluation (1947).

 

Stevenson confirmed this in A Gossip on Romance:

 

Fiction is to the grown man what play is to the child; it is there that he changes the atmosphere and tenor of his life; and when the game so chimes with his fancy that he can join in it with all his heart, when it pleases him with every turn, when he loves to recall it and dwells upon its recollection with entire delight, fiction is called romance.

 

He taught himself to write well through imitation and practice, but his fictions were not only a form of play; Jenni Calder believed that in Treasure Island and Kidnapped Stevenson was inviting us to join him in the game, and as G. K. Chesterton shrewdly observed:

 

The dialogue is spirited and full of fine Scottish humours, but all these things are almost as secondary in Kidnapped and Catriona as they are in Treasure Island itself. The thing is still simply an adventure story, and especially a boy’s adventure story; such as is fitted to describe the adventures of a boy. And there are moments when it is the same boy; and his name is neither Hawkins nor Balfour, but Stevenson.

 

Both authors caught the reality that Stevenson retained his playful sense of inclusive adventure, but Chesterton’s description of this historical romance par excellence as simply a boy’s adventure story, is a simplification too far. Treasure Island falls into that category, but the genesis of Kidnapped was quite different, and much longer. Here, Stevenson addressed deeper issues of character, culture, history, and politics – a story in which his hero escapes attempted murder and is brutally shanghaied, and a mad boy is killed out of hand by a brutish drunk. There are bloody sword fights, a shipwreck, a government official assassinated, for which an innocent man will be hanged, all described with stark realism, but always with a pawky humour. It is an adventure story certainly, but this Peter Pan of Scottish literature had brought all his skills into play. Kidnapped was a synthesis of Stevenson’s own experiences drawn from his reading, his travels, his knowledge of Scottish history and landscape, his knowledge of dialect, and his knowledge of human nature.

It would not be an exaggeration to suggest that when reading Kidnapped, we are walking through Stevenson’s entire life.

 

The Scenery of Dreams: The True Story of Robert Louis Stevenson’s Kidnapped by Lachlan Munro is published by Deveron Press, priced £14.99

David Keenan’s debut novel This is Memorial Device was one of BooksfromScotland’s favourite reads of 2017, so we are thrilled that he has followed it up so quickly with another cracking book, For The Good Times, which will be released in January 2019. It’s a novel that follows Sammy and his three friends as they come of age in 1970s Belfast, where the usual concerns—music, clothes, girls, comic books, drinking—clash with the criminal and terrorist violence around them. We hope you enjoy this exclusive pre-publication taster.

 

Extract taken from For The Good Times
By David Keenan
Published by Faber

 

Longhairs came late to Belfast. It was 1972 before I ever clapped eyes on a hippy, but there he was right enough, sitting on the ground at a bus stop on the Lisburn Road in the blazing sunshine, with his bare feet and an acoustic guitar round his neck with a piece of string; I could barely believe my lamps.

So as some longhairs turn up at the wedding, some hippy bastards, and they stand out like plums. Tommy starts to making jokes. Look at these fucking women, he says, and he’s doing this comedy walk, mincing up and down. I’m sure I recognise one of them but I can’t place him. At this point I don’t know any of the boys with the long hair. Then this guy who I nearly almost recognise comes over with some of his longhair pals and he walks up to Tommy. Are you Tommy Kentigern? he says to him. Tommy says to him, who wants to know, fucking Bob Marley? and he turns round to us and he’s all laughing and winking. The guy is just looking at him. What are you talking about? he says to him. Bob Marley is a Rastafarian. I don’t give a fuck what you are, Tommy says to him. Tommy’s confused, Pat says, he means Bob Dylan. Don’t fucking correct me, Tommy says to Pat, and he turns on him. I mean fucking Bob Marley, he says. What songs does Bob Marley sing? the guy asks him and there was something in the way he says it, something arrogant in his voice, that made me recognise him for who he was. Ah fuck, I says to myself, it’s only fucking Mackle McConaughey, this guy’s a commandant in the IRA. A killer, a hero, a serious guy. I put my hand on Tommy’s shoulder. Tommy, I says to him, take it easy. Take it easy, he says to me, what the fuck is wrong with you? Then he turns back to Mack. Bob Marley sings the song about the wind, he says to him, don’t fucking try to cheat me. It’s Bob Dylan what sings the song about the fucking wind, Mack says to him, cool as you like. Look, I says to the both of them, who gives a fuck about Bob Marley and Bob Dylan. Excuse me if I’m wrong, I says, but you’re Mackle McConaughey, are you not? One of his longhair pals steps up to me. Who the fuck are you? he says. I’m Samuel McMahon, I says to him. Sure, I thought it was yourself, McConaughey says to me. Suddenly he’s all friendly, like. How’s your ma? he says to me. Ah, she’s grand, I says to him.

You’re Mackle McConaughey? Tommy says. Now he can’t believe his lamps. I’m sorry for calling you Bob Marley, he says. That was unforgivable. Sure, I probably did mean Bob Dylan. Fuck it, Mack says, let’s get the green in, and he and his boys head to the bar. I’m starting to breathe again. Tommy gives me a look and under his breath he says to me, is the fucking Ra really coming to this? But we all end up getting half-blocked and at one point Mack actually gets up onstage with the band and sings ‘Blowin’ in the Wind’.

Now Tommy knew nothing about the rock n roll. None of us did. I mean, we all went to see Bill Haley when he played Belfast. That was just an excuse to rip out the seats. But that night I looked at Mack, who had his arm around Tommy by this point, the pair of them completely blocked and talking into each other’s faces, and I thought to myself, the times they are a-fucking changin’ alright.

 

For The Good Times by David Keenan is published by Faber, priced £12.99

Stuart Cosgrove’s Harlem 69 is the final instalment in the author’s critically acclaimed trilogy on the story of soul music and the US civil rights movement, which began with Detroit 67 and followed by Memphis 68, which won the Penderyn Prize as ‘Music Book of the Year’ in 2018.  Taking a look at the Black Panther show trials, the heroin pandemic that spread across the district, and the music that went on to inspire future generations of Black music makers, Harlem 69 is essential reading and will make you head out to your nearest record store. But, if you’re tightening your purse strings, then don’t worry: Stuart Cosgrove has put together his top ten playlist inspired by his latest book. Enjoy.

 

Harlem 69: The Future of Soul
By Stuart Cosgrove
Published by Polygon

 

1. Nina Simone ‘Young Gifted and Black’ a sung at the Harlem Culture Festival 1969 as a tribute to Nina Simone’s dearly departed friend, the radical playwright Lorraine Hansberry.

 

 

2. Donny Hathaway’s ‘The Ghetto’ a pioneering soul song written by Donny Hathaway in his apartment in Washington DC in the aftermath of Martin Luther King’s assassination. It became synonymous with streets of Harlem

 

 

3. ‘Cashing In’ by The Voices of East Harlem. An underground northern soul classic by a Harlem community choir the song is about money, bad faith and love.

 

4. ‘The Revolution Will Not Be Televised’ – In 1969 a young jazz poet, Gil Scot Heron was already a newly published writer, desperate to record his first album.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qGaoXAwl9kw

 

5. Damn Sam, Miracle Man and the Soul Congregation were an underground Harlem band that have since become one of the most respected street funk bands ever.

 

 

6. Bobby Womack’s ‘Across 110th Street’ is one of Harlem’s great landmark songs. Street life, survivalism and sidewalk poetry.

 

 

7. ‘Freddie’s Dead’ by Curtis Mayfield – the tragic tale of a Harlem drug peddlar who meets his final deal, the standout track in the epic ‘Superfly’ soundtrack.

 

 

8. Frank Foster’s ‘Harlem Rumble’ a tense streetwise instrumental sounds like a chase sequence in a great ghetto theme movie

 

 

9. ‘Spanish Harlem’ Aretha Franklin’s tribute to Harlem’s Eastside, the Hispanic capital of the USA.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFNqwQ8vdAY

 

10. In Harlem in 1969, Afeni Shakur a female leader of the Black Panthers was on trial falsely accused of plotting a bombing campaign. Out on bail her son was conceived and eventually born after she had been acquitted – her son was Tupac Shakur – the hip-hop master of Thug Life.

 

Harlem 69: The Future of Soul by Stuart Cosgrove is published by Polygon, priced £16.99

David Robinson reflects on the poet’s role in difficult times as he talks to Alexander McCall Smith about his recently published poetry collection.

 

A Gathering: A Personal Anthology of Scottish Poems
Edited by Alexander McCall Smith
Published by Polygon

 

The other day, I found myself reading John MacLeod’s book River of Fire (Birlinn, 2010) about the Clydebank Blitz. To remind you of its scale, in two nights in March 1941, German bombers caused damage so extensive that of the town’s 12,000 dwellings, only seven were undamaged. Four thousand were completely destroyed, and 4,500 were uninhabitable for months. More to the point, 528 people were dead, 617 seriously injured, and the next morning thousands of the 35,000 newly homeless stumbled along the Dumbarton Road towards Glasgow.

We were in the middle of a war. Democracy and national survival were at stake. Like everyone else, Scotland’s poets had a decision to make. What were they going to do? Were they going to fight fascism or not? What would I have done – and what would you?

My point here isn’t to question the morality of pacifism in 1941 (that’s a completely different discussion) but to imagine the strength of character it would have taken to go against so many of your compatriots at a time like that. In March 1941, the US and the USSR were still not involved in the war, Japan was taking control of much of China and the Far East, the Germans had the Brits on the run in Africa, had overrun Europe, and Hitler had just ordered a big expansion of Auschwitz.  The overwhelming majority of Scots were not deterred by any of that but wanted to fight on.

But look at the poets. Norman MacCaig was a conscientious objector; so was Edwin Morgan. Hugh MacDiarmid was conscripted to work in a Scotstoun munitions factory but wrote virulently anti-English poetry in private, and Douglas Young was imprisoned for refusing conscription. In other words, even when Scotland was at its most united – as it surely must have been when its towns and cities were being bombed, and Britain was isolated and faced a credible threat of invasion – many of its leading poets went against the popular flow.  They made it clear that they didn’t want to fight. At such a time and place, rebelliousness like that takes guts.

This thought crossed my mind only because at the same time as reading MacLeod’s River of Fire, I was also reading A Gathering, Alexander McCall Smith’s personal anthology of Scottish poems, which has just been published by Polygon. How Scotland’s poets reacted to the Second World War isn’t mentioned in the book in anything other than the brief biographical notes at the end. But it did make me wonder whether McCall Smith thought Scottish poets were a particularly rebellious bunch. So – on National Poetry Day, as it happens – I asked him.

‘Auden talked about the effects of society on the poet,’ he pointed out. ‘He said that ‘Ireland hurt Yeats into poetry’. And you can say that about many poets, that they are hurt into poetry because they contemplate the world and they see its contradictions and its difficulties.’

In Scotland’s case, he added, there is another factor. ‘Until the re-emergence of the Scottish Parliament it seemed to many people that Scotland had a somewhat distant legislature and Scotland may have found difficulties in expressing herself through such an institution. You find that very strongly in the 20th century Scottish Poetry Renaissance led by MacDiarmid who is a classic example of that. He was a rebel against virtually everybody.’

A Gathering takes the Second World War as a cut-off point: it doesn’t include anyone born after it. This, says McCall Smith, was ‘just a matter of setting limits to make the anthology do-able, and not a matter of my own personal taste’. Another reason, one suspects, might well be that the famously polite bestselling author might not have wanted to make invidious choices among contemporary poets.

Of the poets included in the book, he met MacCaig, MacDiarmid and Hamish Henderson. The latter seems to have made the greatest impression. ‘He was tall, rather ungainly man,’ he writes, ‘a bit like a well-built scarecrow, as he often wore a hat that no self-respecting scarecrow would consider wearing. He smiled at people with gentle, wry smile, exposing teeth that seemed to go in all sorts of directions. He was sitting on a table, singing, unaccompanied, that great poem he wrote, ‘The 51st Highland Division’s Farewell to Sicily’. That simple tune, so easy to remember, never leaves you once you have heard it. It breaks the heart.’

That last phrase is, of course, an echo of what MacDiarmid said ‘the little white rose of Scotland’ does too – almost as if McCall Smith is acting as a retrospective peacemaker between the two flyting poetic rebels who can, as Tim Neat wrote in his Guardian obituary of Henderson ‘be seen to stand as the twin piers of revolutionary thought in modern Scotland: MacDiarmid the small ascetic, atheistic Presbyterian, Henderson the Falstaffian Episcopalian libertarian.’

Of the two, my own sympathies are with Henderson. His rebelliousness took many forms: not only turning down the OBE offered him by the Thatcher government but in writing poems and songs that consistently show him thinking internationally, far beyond his tribe (as well as lovingly within it). ‘Seven Good Germans’, for example, is full of empathy for dead enemy soldiers left behind in the North African desert. And in ‘Elegies for the Dead in Cyrenaica’ he adds ‘that we should not disfigure ourselves/With villainy of hatred’. In the middle of war, it’s easy enough to succumb to disfiguring hatred: it takes a certain rebelliousness of mind not to.

Auden has long been McCall Smith’s favourite poet – he has even written a book about him – not just because of his technical mastery and his ability to make us change the way we see things, but because ‘he understands the notion of civilisation, and that makes him invaluable in these dark times’. The Scottish writer who comes closest in this regard, he says, is Ruthven (pronounced ‘Riven’) Todd (1914-78) whose poem ‘In September 1937’, included in the anthology, is a particular favourite.

‘It’s a poem of absolute beauty,’ McCall Smith says. ‘In it, he is thinking about a previous year in which he was back on Mull, stacking peat, where ‘the hills /Were brown lions, crouched to meet the autumn gales’. The poem is haunted by a growing sense of crisis – and I think that poetry of that sort resonates with us today because there is a slight whiff of the 1930s about our own age.’

Auden called his 1947 ‘baroque eclogue’ The Age of Anxiety. Few read it these days, but the title endures. It fits our decade just as it did the 1940s or that ‘long, dishonest decade’ that preceded it. In these anxious, hate-filled times, writing and thinking beyond our own social media silos is a necessary rebellion, and I hope we can still rely on our poets to provide it.

 

A Gathering: A Personal Anthology of Scottish Poems, edited by Alexander McCall Smith, is published by Polygon, priced £14.99.

Every adventure has to begin with a dream, and in For Every One, Jason Reynolds has written a beautiful and inspirational clarion call to dreamers everywhere.

 

Extract taken from For Every One
by Jason Reynolds
Published by 404 Ink and Knights Of

 

THIS LETTER ISN’T

for any specific

kind of dream.

It isn’t intended

for a certain genre,

medium,

trade, or

denomination.

 

It is only intended

FOR THE COURAGEOUS.

 

Maybe you are a dancer

moving to the sound of your own future;

or a musician

banging strumming bowing plucking

blowing into,

creating soundtracks

for dream trains chugging along

through thick night;

 

or a painter

spilling and splattering confessions

across the face of stretched canvas;

or an actor

praying at the altar

of your alter ego;

or a photographer,

finger on the button

like a quick-draw cowboy,

shooting

not to kill anyone

but to preserve forever;

 

or maybe even

a writer

for some strange reason,

writing expert books,

pages of good intention

and rah-rah and fantasy

and sometimes truth,

or maybe even letters to people

you don’t know but

do know you love.

 

Or maybe you aren’t

an artist at all.

 

DREAMS AREN’T

RESERVED FOR

THE CREATIVES.

 

Maybe you’re an athlete,

a gladiator hoping for

a shot at the lion.

Maybe you’re eighteen

and plan to make your first million

by twenty-five

(it’s not impossible).

Or maybe you’re eighteen

and plan to make it to twenty-one

(it’s not impossible, nor is

twenty-two twenty-three twenty-four).

 

At twenty-five I moved back in with my

mother

and found out

she loved to teach

little kids,

and bake,

and help the needy –

her passion made plain,

her dream made real

after forty years

of forty hours a week

behind a desk.

You might be fifty

and think it’s too late.

 

JUMP ANYWAY.

 

Dreams don’t have timelines,

deadlines,

and aren’t always in

straight lines.

 

JUMP ANYWAY.

 

OR MAYBE

your dream is to have a family,

to wear corny T-shirts

and hold up signs

and be the cameraman

at the little one’s

games.

 

To kiss your child

on head and heart,

selflessly fertilizing

his or her passion.

Stay awake with them

when the dream

is crying

like a colicky infant;

 

help them feed it

and before sleep

do your best to

smother

that tiny ember

of doubt and fear

that glows

beneath the brush.

 

THIS LETTER

IS FOR

US ALL.

 

The awkward angels

with crooked halos and

second-hand wings.

The irresponsible

and curious

fire-bellied babies.

The deformed, with

hearts on the outside

and ears on the inside.

The squares who

use nine-to-five cubes

as planning sessions

for the real work.

 

For the rebel children,

the wild ones

the long-shots

the bad-mouthed

the side-eyed

the terribly terribly

terribly envied

secretly

by the safe.

For those who bear the cross –

the two perpendicular

planks of passion –

who find life is best

when nailed to it.

 

For the jumpers.

For the jumpers.

For the jumpers.

 

THIS LETTER

IS FOR US ALL,

to remind us

that we are many.

That we are right

for trying.

That purpose is real.

That making it is possible.

 

For Every One by Jason Reynolds is published by 404 Ink and Knights Of, priced £5.00

John Maclean, the socialist, internationalist campaigner—celebrated by Lenin and Trotsky—was once named ‘the most dangerous man in Britain’ by British Military Intelligence. His campaigning for peace and prosperity for the working classes cost him his teaching job and saw him imprisoned and force fed while on hunger strike. His principles saw him oppose the First World War and support Irish and Scottish independence, and, when he died, thousands of people lined the streets of Glasgow to see his funeral procession pass. In his new book, Henry Bell explores the events that shaped the man and his politics, as well as Maclean’s social and cultural legacy. Here, Bell writes for BooksfromScotland on why John Maclean’s life and work is as relevant as it’s ever been.

 

John Maclean: Hero of Red Clydeside
By Henry Bell
Published by Pluto Press

 

Naomi Mitchison wrote that the great tragic myth of Scotland was that of the rebel king who died for his people: Christ at Calvary, Wallace at the Tower of London, and John Maclean in the capitalists’ jail at Peterhead. The self-sacrificing rebel who stands up for right and justice has a near-universal appeal: an inherent nobility, combined with a useful inability to argue with those that come after.

Many movements have claimed John Maclean since his death, from the Communist Party of Great Britain to the Scottish National Party. Maclean casts a long shadow over modern Scotland, and yet his writings are little read and his political beliefs not widely known. Many Glaswegians are more likely to think Maclean is the hero of Die Hard than the hero of Red Clydeside. The lack of knowledge about a man who was once Britain’s most famous revolutionary, the most dangerous man in the country, and the celebrated comrade of Lenin and Trotsky, may in part be explained by Maclean’s lifetime of rebellion. Whether in his fight against the British state or the communist leadership, Maclean refused to compromise any of his values. George Lansbury wrote in Maclean’s obituary:

Had he been able to see his way to stand in with the rest of us there is no position he could not have filled: but he followed the light of his conscience wherever it led him.

John Maclean’s earliest political experiences were defined by the poverty of his childhood. By the time he was 18, his father and three of his siblings had died. The remaining family lived in two rooms in Pollokshaws. There Maclean heard his mother and grandmother’s stories of how they had been driven from their home in the highlands by the greed of landlords.  When Maclean’s friends in the Southside of Glasgow convinced him to read the works of Karl Marx he found suddenly a philosophy that explained the suffering of those around him, and, more than that, proposed a cure. When he read Capital in 1900, he paid particular attention to Marx’s lines on the highland clearances:

The “clearing” made by the Duchess of Sutherland will suffice here… All their villages were destroyed and burnt, all their fields turned into pasturage. British soldiers enforced this eviction, and came to blows with the inhabitants. One old woman was burnt to death in the flames of the hut, which she refused to leave. Thus this fine lady appropriated 794,000 acres of land that had from time immemorial belonged to the clan.

Maclean saw in Marxism a way to understand the world around him, the history and the future of the Scottish working class. He joined the nascent British Socialist Party and began his work as a Marxist lecturer and pamphleteer.

But even within the British Socialist Party Maclean could not help but rebel. When the party’s leadership supported the government in building up the army to defend against German expansion, Maclean was clear that his loyalty was not to his party or his country, but to the international working class. He told the people of Scotland that:

The men they were asked to shoot were their brothers, with the same difficulty on Saturdays to find rent for their miserable dwellings, who had to suffer the same insults and impertinence from their gaffers and foremen … What did it matter if they looked a little different? And spoke a different language?… their real enemy was the employers, and that as long as turning lathes, ploughs, looms, ships – all the tools of wealth production – were possessed by a small class of privileged people, then so long they would be slaves. To get free from this slavery was their real concern… The victory of Socialism must be world-wide.

Maclean campaigned fiercely against the First World War and his actions were recognised in London and in Moscow. The workers in Russia made him honorary president of the Soviet along with Lenin and Trotsky, and the British Government had him arrested and tried for sedition. In the dock Maclean made his most famous speech. He refused to plead innocent or guilty, and instead told the court that he rejected the justice of the ruling class, and appealed only to the working class:

I am a socialist, and have been fighting and will fight for an absolute reconstruction of society for the benefit of all. I am proud of my conduct. I have squared my conduct with my intellect, and if everyone had done so this war would not have taken place. I act square and clean for my principles. I have nothing to retract. I have nothing to be ashamed of. Your class position is against my class position. There are two classes of morality. There is the working class morality and there is the capitalist class morality.

He was sentenced to hard labour, jailed, and force fed. But within a year public pressure was so great that the government agreed to release Maclean. He arrived back in Glasgow fighting for communism, independence and a free Ireland, and battling against the Labour party from within. He told the workers that if they must, they should vote for ‘pink Labour’, but that what was needed was a red revolution. He was seen by many as an extremist, but he never lost the support of the most oppressed sections of Scottish society.

Maclean rebelled against the war, the state, and the Scottish and British left: seeing in all of them a failure to deliver the people from exploitation and oppression. He was the consummate rebel, unable to accept any compromise, though willing to fight, as he put it, for any palliative that would improve the lives of the workers on their way to revolution. In his memorial to Maclean, Edwin Morgan wrote:

Failures may be interesting, but it is the firmness
of what he wanted and did not want
that raises eyebrows; when does the quixotic
begin to gel, begin to impress, at what point
of naked surprise?

… Maclean was not naive, but
“We are out
for life and all that life can give us”
was what he said, that’s what he said.

And that is the truth, Maclean was out for everything. He didn’t want reform or compromise, his rebellion was to secure life and all that it can give to the workers of Scotland and the world.

Henry Bell will be joined by James Kelman and others on December 1^st at Stereo in Glasgow for a Maclean Centenary event.
https://www.stereocafebar.com/events/2018-12-01-john-maclean-centenary-living-rent-benefit-stereo

‘John Maclean: Hero of Red Clydeside’ by Henry Bell is published by Pluto Press, priced £14.99

Edinburgh University Press have just released a fully revised and extended edition of their highly regarded reference work that illuminates the lives of Scottish women in history. And there are plenty of rebels to be found in these pages. We have a little taster, two of the new additions to the dictionary, two amazing life stories here on BooksfromScotland. There are so many inspirational women to be found in the dictionary; you’ll just have to buy a copy to find your next Scottish heroine!

 

Extract taken from The New Biographical Dictionary of Scottish Women
Edited by Elizabeth Ewan, Rose Pipes, Jane Rendall and Siân Reynolds
Published by Edinburgh University Press

 

SULTER, Maud, born Glasgow 19 Sept. 1960, died Dumfries 27 Feb. 2008.

Visual artist, photographer, writer, cultural activist. Daughter of Elsie Sulter, tramcar conductress, and Claud Ennin, eye surgeon and diplomat.

Of Scottish and Ghanaian descent, Maud Sulter left Glasgow at 17 to attend the London College of Fashion, later graduating with MA in Photographic Studies at the University of Derby. A cultural polymath, she co-founded and was active in a range of Black feminist and lesbian projects from the early 1980s, and was uncompromising in her indictment of the inequalities that dogged the creative endeavours of Black women, both historically and in contemporary culture. Her work across several genres explored the terrain of colonialism, the erasure of Black women’s history and the enduring presence of Africa in Europe.

From the landmark The Thin Black Line exhibition curated by Lubaina Himid (ICA, London, 1986), to her inclusion in the Johannesburg Biennial (1995), Maud Sulter’s work was widely shown, and is in many private and public collections including the NPG, SNPG, Scottish Parliament and Victoria and Albert Museum. She was the recipient of a Momart fellowship at Tate Liverpool (1990).

Maud Sulter joined Lubaina Himid as codirector of the influential Elbow Room Gallery at the end of the 1980s. As both curator and editor, she showcased her own work and that of other Black women creatives in ground-breaking exhibitions such as Zabat (1989) and Syrcas (1993), and publications including Passion: discourses on blackwomen’s creativity (1990). Her photographic works and montages, such as Hysteria (1991), Les Bijoux (2002) and Jeanne Duval: a melodrama (2003) are increasingly read as pioneering (see Cherry 2015). Alongside academic writing, she published a play,

Service to Empire (2002), and several collections of poetry: As a Blackwoman (1985, which won the Vera Bell Prize); Zabat: poetics of a family tree (1989); and Sekhmet (2005). A prolific prose writer, she contributed many essays to magazines and journals as well as exhibition catalogues. In her final years, Maud Sulter, who had three children, returned to Scotland, a country to which she remained closely connected. She died from cancer aged 47.

 

WRIGHT, Frances (Fanny), m. Phiquepal d’Arusmont, born Dundee 6 Sept. 1795, died Cincinnati, Ohio 13 Dec. 1852.

Utopian socialist, feminist, freethinker. Daughter of Camilla Campbell, and James Wright, radical Dundee merchant.

Both parents having died in 1798, Fanny and her sister Camilla Wright (1797–1831), after childhood in London and Devon, stayed with their great-uncle James Mylne, Professor of Moral Philosophy at Glasgow, and his wife Agnes Millar. Fanny Wright educated herself in the university library, writing a treatise on an imagined female disciple of Epicurus, A Few Days in Athens (1822), and several plays, including Altorf (1819). Through the influence of sisters Robina Millar and *Margaret Cullen, she was attracted by the example of the American republic. In 1818, she and Camilla travelled there: in February 1819 Altorf was staged on Broadway. On her return, she published her letters to Robina Millar as Views of Society and Manners in America (1821), greeted with enthusiasm by The Scotsman, but viewed by the Quarterly Review as a ‘ridiculous and extravagant panegyric on the government and people of the United States’ (Eckhardt 1984, pp. 47–8). Fanny Wright criticised the republic only for the institution of slavery, and, to a lesser extent, its treatment of women. In Paris in 1821, she met the Marquis de Lafayette, veteran of the American and French Revolutions, to whom she became devoted. With Camilla, she returned to the USA to join him in 1824, and was further inspired by Robert Owen’s new community at New Harmony, Indiana. At Nashoba, Tennessee, from 1825, she planned first a model farm, of which both she and Camilla were resident trustees, based on the labour of purchased black slaves, then a utopian community, following Owen’s ideas. Though initially successful, in July 1827 Nashoba received unwelcome publicity about inter-racial sex, suggesting this was approved by the Wright sisters.

Back in Europe, Fanny Wright met the ensuing storm of disapproval by publicly justifying a co-operative, biracial community of equals, and condemning oppressive laws on marriage and attitudes to miscegenation. Returning in December 1827, she found Nashoba failing economically and in its ideals and Camilla newly married. Fanny Wright joined Owen’s son, Robert Dale Owen, in New Harmony, becoming joint editor of the New Harmony Gazette (later Free Enquirer). Unprecedentedly, she also began to lecture to large mixed audiences across the US on anti-slavery and co-operation, free thought and marriage reform. Opponents labelled her ‘the Red Harlot of Infidelity’ (Eckhardt 1984, p. 3). In 1829 the Wright sisters and Robert Dale Owen moved to New York, drawn by the situation of urban artisans and the New York Working Men’s Party. Having taken her freed slaves to Haiti, accompanied by a former Nashoba settler, William Phiquepal (b. 1811), Fanny Wright became pregnant with his child, and returned to France in June 1830. Camilla followed, but died in Paris in childbirth in February 1831. Fanny married Phiquepal in 1831, after the birth of her daughter Sylva. Her later years were spent in poverty in France and the USA, often separated from husband and daughter, writing her autobiography and her major work, England the Civiliser (1848). In 1844 she inherited property in Dundee, but her husband’s financial demands led to a divorce suit, estrangement from her daughter, and legal conflict until her death in 1852. Fanny Wright’s portrait became the frontispiece of the six-volume History of Woman Suffrage in a sincere tribute to ‘the first woman who gave lectures on political subjects in America’ and spoke ‘on the equality of the sexes’ (Stanton et al., 1881, I, pp. 35, 691–2; II, 429; III, 293).

 

The New Biographical Dictionary of Scottish Women edited by Elizabeth Ewan, Rose Pipes, Jane Rendall and Siân Reynolds is published by Edinburgh University Press, priced £35.00

In 1724, huge numbers of armed gangs, of men, women & children roamed the Galloway countryside levelling dykes built around the expanding number of cattle fields. These cattle fields were introduced by landlords as far back as a century earlier in a bid to make the land more profitable to them, but it was only in the 1720s that the revolt, later named the ‘Leveller’s Revolt’, became widespread and worrisome enough that armed guards were called in to protect the fields and quell dissent. The revolt gained national attention from the church, state and even the King. In this extract, taken from The Scottish Clearances, author Tom Devine looks at the factors that contributed to this very specific armed resistance.

 

Extract taken from The Scottish Clearances: A History of the Dispossessed, 1600-1900
By Tom Devine
Published by Allen Lane

 

Part of the answer might be found in the economic sphere. By the early eighteenth century the big cattle farms were beginning to encroach on, and enclose, open or common grazing grounds, the ‘commonties’ referred to earlier in the chapter. That process would have proven a serious threat to peasant communities which were not subject to direct eviction. They would have experienced profound problems from strategies which menaced the tight margins of their household economies.

The slender balance between subsistence and shortage might have been squeezed by the annexation of common lands. Again, there is evidence that not only landowners but tenant farmers had tried to exploit the new post-Union market opportunities in the cattle trade. Some had invested in more stock because of those possibilities. Now, however, as ‘parking’ intensified, they stood to lose the vitally important access to the common grazings for the livestock they had purchased at great risk. For them and their families, descent into penury and beggary might follow.

There was also the economic context of the Galloway clearances to be considered. As argued in Chapter 4, in parts of the central and eastern Borders, the dispossession of small tenants and cottars to make way for larger sheep runs was paralleled by the growth of cottage industry and employment opportunities for the displaced in the towns of Kelso, Hawick, Selkirk and Jedburgh. But these alternatives were not available to anything like the same extent in Galloway, where woollen working and other manufactures were much less developed. It is likely, therefore, that the poorer rural communities in the western Borders were faced with a much narrower set of options: acceptance of ‘parking’ and eventual likely eviction, or violent resistance in an attempt to reverse the transformation of the old agrarian society. . .

In addition, however, we also need to probe the complex world of west Border political and religious history in order to provide a comprehensive explanation for the Levellers’ Revolt. Arguably it is there that the distinctive origins of the disturbances can be found. Several aspects of the recent Galloway past are relevant to the analysis. The long Covenanting tradition of south-west Scotland was important. The restoration of King Charles II in 1660 led once again to the rule of bishops in the Presbyterian church. This action was thought heretical and oppressive by many pious communities and their ministers, and in open conflict with the sacred Covenants between Christ and his church established during the civil wars of the 1640s. As a result, many clergymen left their parishes and held alternative open-air services or conventicles. These were soon outlawed by the state as treason and the army then enforced the will of the King, often in a particularly brutal fashion. This period, known as the ‘Killing Times’, is still marked in the countryside around Wigtown, Kirkcudbright and Dumfries by the many memorials to the martyrs who defied the civil authorities and faithfully clung to their ideals despite savage state oppression. Galloway remained a hotbed of Covenanting activity despite the draconian policies of the monarchy.

Not surprisingly, the majority of the population were therefore enthusiastic about the removal of the Stuart king, James VII and II, in the ‘Glorious Revolution’ of 1688–9. But then the Jacobite Rising of 1715 rekindled the old fears of a Stuart counter-revolution. Bitter memories were revived, not simply of the Killing Times, but also of the many years of Presbyterian struggle between the signing of the National Covenant in 1638 and the Revolution of 1688.

 

The Scottish Clearances: A History of the Dispossessed, 1600-1900 by Tom Devine is published by Allen Lane, priced £25.00

Helen Lamb was a poet and short-story writer of renown, as well as a much-beloved creative writing tutor. She died shortly after she finished her first novel, Three Kinds of Kissing, just published by Vagabond Voices. It’s a beautifully perceptive and sensitive novel of two friends in a small town caught in their awkward transition from girlhood to adolescence, full of dreams, adventure, vulnerability and yearning, and it deserves a wide readership.

 

Extract taken from Three Kinds of Kissing
By  Helen Lamb
Published by Vagabond Voices

 

1969

 

That May before Olive went to high school, she was five inches taller than me and ten months older, half an inch for every month. I still had to haul myself up and cling on by my fingertips to see the signal box behind the railway bridge. But Olive could see clear over the parapet and wave to the signalman.

If he looked up and shook his head, we wouldn’t wait. He knew we weren’t interested in the local trains that chugged to a halt at the station. It had to be an InterCity from Aberdeen or Inverness, whooshing straight through like the north wind. Long before we saw it, we heard the rumbling, held our breath while it grew into a roar. And as it blasted towards us, Olive yelled NOW and we let rip, bawling our lungs out, while carriage after carriage went shooting under us and the bridge shuddered.

I don’t remember what I yelled. All I can remember now is Olive mouthing STOP. HELP.

 

 1973

 

Four years on, the day after Olive goes missing, the railway bridge comes back to me, the burnt air rushing around us, blood buzzing. Her parents suspect she got on a train. They come to the door asking to speak to me and Mum says, “Of course.” I don’t get a choice.

They sit side by side on the settee and she takes the armchair opposite. I stay on my feet. Olive’s dad says, “The two of you used to be close. Have you any idea where she might go?”

Mum says, “Think.”

I shake my head. Olive stopped hanging around with me a long time ago.

Mum doesn’t give up. “When did you speak to her last?” “Tuesday morning, maybe, at the bus stop.” But I’m not really sure. Olive and I got on the school bus at the same stop along with thirty or so other people. Sometimes we said hi, sometimes not. On the way back, she usually got off two stops before me in Station Road. One night last week though, she stayed on and we walked home together. It was the first time in ages. I don’t mention this.

So far I haven’t told a lie.

Her dad leans forward and stares at my mum. His eyes are bloodshot and fierce. “It was her birthday yesterday,” he says. “Sixteen.” He tells us it was also her day for the gym. She took her duffel bag as well as her school bag and set off for school as usual. That night, when her dinner lay cold on the table, they found her gym kit under her bed.

He squeezes his eyes shut tight now, and Olive’s mum explodes. “What about the empty baked bean cans? What about the filthy spoon? It was a midden under that bed.”

He flinches and frowns down at the floor. “Olive’s mess, Olive’s business, I thought we agreed.”

Mum looks across at me. “We won’t say a word now, will we Grace?”

He mumbles thanks, clears his throat and tells us how the police discovered Olive’s school bag in the Ladies at the railway station, hidden in the waste bin beneath a heap of paper towels. Her uniform and black school shoes were stuffed inside. She had sixty-five pounds saved up from her Saturday job at the hairdresser’s, as far as he knows, and only one change of clothes, including her green velvet jacket and cream patent shoes.

“No spare underpants,” Olive’s mum says. He goes to take her hand and she swats him away.

He says, “I don’t think we can be sure of that.” But she is adamant she can account for every pair. I believe she can too. That’s the scary part.

This afternoon, I don’t have any answers for Olive’s parents. But they’re only interested in where she went. They don’t ask if I know why. After they leave, my mum says, “It’s just like Gina Broadfoot to focus on the mess. You’d think she’d be more concerned about the secret eating.”

I’m scared she’ll start quizzing me about Olive again but she lets me go out.

 

Three Kinds of Kissing by Helen Lamb is published by Vagabond Voices, priced £9.95

2017 saw Catalonia come under the world’s spotlight as its people voted in favour of independence in a referendum that was rejected by the Spanish authorities and the EU. In his latest book Catalonia Reborn: How Catalonia Took On the Corrupt Spanish State and the Legacy of Franco, Chris Bambery looks at Catalan history and culture as well as the current independence movement. Below he talks of the rise of Spanish nationalism.

 

Catalonia Reborn: How Catalonia Took On the Corrupt Spanish State and the Legacy of Franco
by Chris Bambery & George Kerevan
Published by Luath Press

 

 

And here too, in an extract taken from the book is a timeline of historical events in the region.

Classical Age – Fertile Catalan coastal region emerges as key link in Phoeni­cian, Greek, Carthaginian and finally Roman Mediterranean trading empires.

8th–11th centuries – Islamic rule in most of Spain but Catalan border lands remain contested after Charles Martel defeats Arab-Berber armies at Poitiers, in 732 ad.

801 – Franks occupy Barcelona, creating a buffer between Charlemagne’s Empire and Muslim Spain. Catalan monasteries become major cultural cen­tres transmitting knowledge between Christian and Muslim worlds.

870 – Wilfred the Hairy, Count of Gerona and Barcelona, unites four Cata­lan feudal counties, creating powerful state straddling the Pyrenees. Inward migration creates free peasantry and agricultural boom.

988 – Count Borrell ii refuses to renew oath of loyalty to the Frankish kings. Feudal Catalonia declares de facto independence.

1023–76 – Under Ramon Berenguer i, the county of Barcelona acquires a dominant economic and political position in the area.

12th century – First mention of the term Catalonia.

1137 – Catalonia and Kingdom of Aragon to the south-west unite through marriage to become the Crown of Catalonia and Aragon, though Catalan autonomy remains intact. Over the next three centuries, Catalan empire spreads across the Western Mediterranean to Sicily and Sardinia.

1359 – The Generalitat of Catalonia established, with a president and what is considered one of Europe’s earliest parliaments.

1469 – King Ferdinand of Catalonia and Aragon marries Queen Isabella of Castile, uniting the two Spanish monarchies. But Catalonia retains self-rule, with its own political institutions, courts and laws.

1474 – First printed book in Catalan.

1640–1659 – War of the Reapers: Catalan peasants rise up against the mon­archy amid anger over taxation and being forced to station and provision troops fighting against France. Strengthens tradition of popular Catalan resistance to external rule.

1659 – Spain and France sign the Treaty of the Pyrenees and Catalonia loses the northernmost part of its territory.

1705 – War of the Spanish Succession: Fearful of a French Bourbon king on the Spanish throne, the Catalans ally themselves with England in defence of their traditional autonomy.

1713 – Tory government in Great Britain resolves to end the Spanish war and signs the Treaty of Utrecht. It wins trade concessions and territory, including Gibraltar. Abandoned, Catalonia keeps fighting.

1714 – Barcelona falls to the Bourbons after a 14-month siege, on 11 September – thereafter celebrated as National Day in Catalonia. Generalitat abolished and Catalan language suppressed.

1796–1814 – French Revolutionary and Peninsula War. Napoleon at first restores Catalan independence but then annexes Catalonia to France. With end of wars, absolutism renewed under Ferdinand vii.

19th century – With the loss of its American colonies, Spain enters a century of economic decline. The exception is Catalonia, where rapid industrialisa­tion creates a new, militant working class and triggers a cultural and linguis­tic renaissance, reviving Catalan nationalism.

1833 – First steam-driven textile mill in Barcelona. Burned down two years later by striking workers.

1873 – First Spanish Republic declared, committed to liberalism, moderni­sation and federalism. Overthrown by the army the following year. Bour­bons restored.

1888 – Founding (in Barcelona) of Spanish Socialist Party (PSOE) and Gen­eral Workers’ Union (UGT). Universal exhibition in Barcelona.

1898 – Catalan business hurt when Spain loses Cuba. Reinforces desire of Catalan middle class for more political and economic autonomy.

1895–1906 – Zenith of Catalan Modernist architecture.

1901 – Formation of middle class Catalan Regionalist League, supporting autonomy not independence.

1909 – Working class uprising in Barcelona (‘Tragic Week’) triggered by opposition to sending Catalan conscripts to colonial war in Morocco.

1910 – Anarchist CNT founded in Barcelona.

1914 – Limited self-government returned to Catalonia under the leadership of Enric Prat de la Riba.

1917 – General strike in Barcelona.

1923 – Miguel Primo de Rivera imposes a military dictatorship in Spain. Catalan self-government and language supressed yet again.

1931 – With the collapse of the de Rivera dictatorship, Spain becomes a republic (again). An autonomous Catalan government, the Generalitat, is created under the leadership of Francesc Macia and the new Republican Left of Catalonia (ERC). Spain enters period of intense instability.

1934 – Following election of a right-wing Spanish government, new Cata­lan president, Luis Companys, declares independence. But this breakaway is suppressed by the army and Companys is jailed. Leftist rising in Asturias also supressed. Spain divided between left and right.

1936 – Popular Front government elected in Spain. Catalan autonomy restored under freed Companys. Franco mounts a military coup, which fails in Catalonia due to popular action. Spanish Civil War begins.

1937 – Communists and Spanish Republican government repress Catalan left-wing opposition of POUM and CNT. Andreu Nin murdered.

1939 – Barcelona occupied by Francoist forces. Catalan language banned in public, Catalan newspapers, books and culture suppressed. Thousands executed, hundreds of thousands flee into exile.

1940 – Lluis Companys executed by firing squad at Montjuic Castle.

1947 – First signs of popular resistance to Franco when Catalan used (ille­gally) in public at religious celebrations at Monserrat.

1951 – Tram boycott in Barcelona forces concessions from regime.

1954 – Josep Tarradellas elected Catalan President in exile.

1960s – Catalan economy revives with start of mass tourism and increasing industrialisation. Barcelona attracts large numbers of migrants from other Spanish regions. Growing cultural and political opposition to the Dictator­ship led by students at Barcelona University.

1960 – Franco’s visit to Barcelona met with civil disobedience.

1962 – New strike wave leads to creation of Communist-led unions, the Commissions Obreres.

1974 – Regime executes Salvador Puig Antich, despite world-wide pleas for clemency. Mass resistance to the Dictatorship in Catalonia.

1975 – Franco dies. Juan Carlos I declared king.

1977 – First, limited democratic elections are held in Spain. One million Catalans demonstrate on 11 September. New regime allows Josep Tarradel­las to return from exile.

1979 – New Statute of Autonomy for (devolved) Catalonia finally approved. Catalonia is defined as a ‘nationality’ but not a nation.

1980 – Moderate, regionalist Convergència i Unió (CIU), led by Jordi Pujol, wins the first of many elections to new Catalan parliament.

1981 – Failed military coup frightens Spanish governments into limiting autonomy for Catalonia and Basque Lands. Sets scene for later friction.

1992 – Olympics hosted in Barcelona.

2003 – Left-wing victory in Catalan elections. Massive demonstrations against Iraq War in Barcelona. Demands for greater Catalan autonomy.

2006 – New Statute of Autonomy is approved by Catalan Parliament, by the Spanish Parliament and by a referendum in Catalonia. This settlement is opposed by the Spanish right and the Popular Party.

2008 – Global banking crisis and collapse of the Spanish property bubble triggers mass unemployment in Spain and Catalonia.

2010 – Spain’s highly politicised Constitutional Court, in judgement on a case brought by the Popular Party, waters down the new Statute of Auton­omy. For the first time since Franco’s death, there is a majority in Catalonia for independence.

2011 – The 15-M anti-austerity movement erupts across Spain. In Barcelona, anti-austerity and nationalist sentiments combine, undermining the tradi­tional autonomist leadership of the CIU.

2012 – In response to the anti-austerity protests, Catalan President Artur Mas asks for negotiations on a new fiscal pact with Spain. Madrid refuses. A major independence demonstration brings 1.5 million people on to the streets of Barcelona in protest. Under pressure, Mas calls for an indepen­dence referendum. Catalan National Assembly founded.

2013 – Nearly two million people link hands across Catalonia calling for independence – possibly the largest demonstration in European history. Artur Mas asks Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy to discuss a referen­dum. Madrid snubs the request.

2014 – The Catalan Government holds a consultative referendum on inde­pendence. Over 80 per cent of the 2.25m votes cast favour the independence option.

2015 – Pro-independence parties win a clear majority in fresh election to the Catalan Parliament. Under pressure from the far-left CUP party, Artur Mas is replaced by Carles Puigdemont as Catalan President.

2017 –

1 October: With Madrid still refusing negotiations, the Catalan Parliament holds a second independence referendum. Despite savage Spanish police attacks on polling stations, 2,020,000 voters (91.96 per cent) answer ‘Yes’, while 177,000 say ‘No’. Puigdemont asks Madrid to enter a dialogue bro­kered by the EU. The Spanish Government and the EU both reject these overtures.

3 October: General strike across Catalonia in protest at Guardia Civil brutality on referendum day. Over 700,000 demonstrate in Barcelona. TV broadcast by King Filipe fails to condemn police action.

16 October: Two prominent independence leaders – Jordi Sanchez of the Catalan National Assembly and Jordi Cuixart of Omnium Cultural – arrest­ed and imprisoned on charges of sedition.

27 October: Catalan Parliament votes to declare an independent Catalan Republic. Immediately, Spanish Senate invokes Article 155 of the constitu­tion and imposes direct rule over Catalonia. Prime Minister Rajoy dissolves

27 October: Catalan Parliament votes to declare an independent Catalan Republic. Immediately, Spanish Senate invokes Article 155 of the constitu­tion and imposes direct rule over Catalonia. Prime Minister Rajoy dissolves

Catalan Parliament. Puigdemont and Catalan ministers escape into exile in Belgium.

7 December: Over 50,000 Catalans come to Brussels in solidarity with Puig­demont and to demand the EU intervenes in Catalonia. EU ignores.

21 December: Pro-independence parties win narrow majority in election.

2018 –

January 2018 – Three jailed Catalan independence leaders – Oriol Junqueras, Jordi Sànchez and Jordi Cuixart – file a complaint with the United Nations, saying their imprisonment in Spain breaks international law.

March 2018 – The pro-independence majority in the Catalan parliament are unable to elect Jordi Sànchez as president after the Spanish Supreme Court refused to free him from prison so he could attend the session.

A third attempt to elect a new president collapses after a proposal to install Jordi Turull was defeated by 65 votes against 64.

Spain’s Supreme Court plans to try 13 Catalan independence leaders on charges of rebellion.

April 2018 – Carles Puigdemont arrested by German police after crossing the border en route to Belgium after Spain secured a European arrest war­rant while he was visiting Finland. A German court releases him on bail saying the charge of violent rebellion was inadmissible.

Seven activists from the grassroots Committees for the Defence of the Repub­lic are arrested following their campaign of non-violent civil disobedience.

Hundreds of thousands take to the streets of Barcelona on Sunday 15 April to demand freedom for Catalan political prisoners under the slogan ‘Us Volem a Casa’ (‘We want you home’).

May 2018 – Jordi Cuixart, Jordi Sànchez, Oriol Junqueras, Joaquim Forn, Dolors Bassa, Carme Forcadell, Raul Romeva, Josep Rull and Jordi Turull remain in Spanish prisons; Carles Puigdemont is in exile in Germany await­ing trial; Clara Ponsati awaits a Scottish court decision on the validity of the European Arrest Warrant; and Meritxell Serret, Antoni Comín and Lluís Puig remain in Belgium.

 

Catalonia Reborn: How Catalonia Took On the Corrupt Spanish State and the Legacy of Franco by Chris Bambery & George Kerevan is published by Luath Press, priced £12.99

There’s three things you should know about Charlie Ray: his parents are radical computer hackers; he drinks Jekyll serum, which basically means he’s a superhero; and he’s the only one who can save humanity from extinction. He’s not your average teenager. In It’s Only the End of the World, J.A Henderson gives readers a rollicking adventure story—ideal for rebel teens everywhere.

 

Extract taken from It’s Only the End of the World
By J . A Henderson
Published by Kelpies Edge

 

When he let himself into the house, Daffodil McNugget was sitting in the kitchen with his mum, both laughing and sipping steaming mugs of coffee.

“There you are!” His mother looked relieved. “Never known you to be up before one o’ clock during the holidays.” She stretched and yawned. “Me? I’ve just had the best sleep in ages.”

“That’s… eh… good.” Charlie glared at Daffodil. She had dark circles under her eyes but, apart from that, seemed as irritatingly chirpy as the night before.

“Your friend Daffodil here came round to visit, but you were out.” His mum got up and gave her son a hug. “So we’ve been having a nice chat and I’m making a spot of brunch.” She indicated a large pan of bacon and eggs sizzling on the stove. “Daff says she recently moved to Scotland and you’ve been showing her around. That is so nice.”

I am going to kill you! Charlie mouthed over his mother’s shoulder, fighting down his ire. Daffodil merely grinned and blew him a kiss.

“I came to see if you’d like to check out the science exhibition at the museum with me,” she said. “Suddenly I have quite a fascination with technology.”

“I’m busy,” he replied brusquely, clenching both fists behind his back.

“Chuckles!” His mum let go, cheeks scarlet. “Don’t be so rude.” She sat back down and patted Daffodil’s shoulder. “He must have got out of the wrong side of the bed this morning.”

“You call him Chuckles?” Daffodil stifled a smirk.

“Oh, he used to be a happy wee soul,” Marion replied regretfully. “Before he turned into a teenager.”

“Mum!”

“That’s OK, Mrs Ray.” The girl slurped her coffee loudly. “I don’t want to bug him.”

“Please call me Marion. Mrs Ray sounds so… old.”

“And you can call me Mac,” the girl replied. “Daffodil seems a bit… formal. Pretentious even.”

“Idiotic, more like,” Charlie mumbled under his breath. Still, the girl was obviously picking up a fine vocabulary from Frankie.

The doorbell rang.

“My goodness, what an eventful morning.” Marion got to her feet again and went to answer the door. “We even had a power cut earlier, though it’s back on now.”

Charlie rounded on Daffodil as soon as his mother was out of earshot.

“What the hell are you playing at? I told you I didn’t want—”

“Power cut, huh?” She silenced him with a wave of her hand. “You see any other houses affected while you were out? ’Cause I sure didn’t.”

“No,” he confessed.

“Gimme your phone.” Daffodil held out her hand. “Quick.”

Puzzled, Charlie handed it over.

His mum came back in, followed by a balding man wearing blue overalls.

“Hi folks,” he said pleasantly. “I’m here to check your circuits. Had a few calls this morning about a disruption to the electrical grid in the area.”

“That was fast.” Marion picked up the kettle and filled it. “No offence, but you really don’t expect prompt service these days. Would you like a coffee?”

“None taken. And I’d love a brew.” He hoisted a leather tool belt higher on his waist. “If you’ll show me where the fuse box is, it won’t take a minute to check.”

“What a coincidence!” Daffodil had the phone pressed against her ear. “I’m just talkin to my dad and he works for the power company too.”

“Really?” The man looked uncomfortable.

Charlie glanced at his companion. The phone was switched off, but the girl’s other hand was resting on her neck, touching the bulge where Frankie’s chip was implanted. He knew exactly who was talking to her.

“Dad’s askin if you checked the signal box on Marchmont Road,” she said. “The one between Tesco and the bettin office?”

“First thing I tried.” The man relaxed. “But it seems to be fine, so now I’m going house to house.”

“Really?” Daffodil tossed the mobile back to Charlie, who caught it without looking. “’Cause I just made that whole spiel up.”

“Eh… Must be crossed wires, love.” The man laughed nervously, turning to Marion. “Crossed wires, get it? Now, if you’ll show me the fuse box, madam.” He reached into a large pouch on the side of his belt.

Marion swung the kettle and it connected with the stranger’s stubbled jaw. The blow lifted the man off the ground and he landed on the Formica counter with a horrific thud. Charlie skipped back as an automatic pistol dropped from the tool belt and clattered across the floor.

The man sat up, shaking his head. Marion slammed her kettle into his face and he crashed back down, sliding along the counter until his head dropped into the sink.

“Charles Ray.” She blew a wisp of hair from her face. “I think you owe me an explanation.”

“I owe you an explanation?” The boy’s eyes were like saucers. “When did my mum turn into Jackie Chan?”

“Not now, Chaz.” Daffodil still had one hand on her neck and it was obvious Frankie was continuing to relay information to her. “The most likely strategy for our abduction is to have one member of a four-man team infiltrate the buildin disguised as a tradesman, so as not to alert the neighbours. Two more will sneak through the gardens and force the back door. The last person will be hidden out front in case we make a run for it.”

“We’ll discuss this situation later, Mac, including how the hell you know all that.”

Marion grabbed a carving knife from the rack beside her as a heavily armed assailant flung himself through the kitchen window in a halo of shattered glass. Before the intruder could raise his rifle, Charlie’s mum buried the blade in his hand. He dropped the weapon with a screech of pain. Marion butted the astonished man in the face and finished him off with another wallop of her kettle.

“I know how to handle myself,” she informed Daffodil.

“You do seem to have everythin covered, Mrs R.” Daffodil slid off her seat and under the table. “I’ll get outta your way.”

The door to the back garden burst open and slammed into Marion. She sprawled across the floor, clutching her head.

Silhouetted in the frame was the largest man Charlie had ever seen. He had an ugly scar running round his throat like a noose. And he held an automatic pistol in each hand.

“Up against the wall,” he barked. “All of you,”

“You hurt my mum.” Charlie’s eyes narrowed.

“Oh dear,” Daffodil chirped from under the table. “Bad move, King Kong.”

“Against the wall, kid.” Victor motioned with the pistols. “Pronto.”

“Nobody messes with my mother.” Charlie walked towards him.

“Don’t be a moron,” the giant growled. “I will shoot you.”

Charlie somersaulted sideways onto the kitchen table, landing on splayed hands. He bent his elbows, arched his back and pushed as Victor fired. Bullets gouged furrows in the wood, but the boy was already in the air. Both of his feet crashed down on the handle of the frying pan. Bacon, eggs and hot fat sailed across the room and hit the giant square in his face. He gave a high-pitched scream and clawed at his eyes. Charlie caught the pan effortlessly in mid-flight, spun with the precision of a discus thrower and hurled it like a Frisbee. The pan crunched into the man’s forehead, knocking him backwards into the garden. As Victor attempted to get up, Charlie followed him outside, picking up the discarded pan as he went.

 

Thunk. Thunk. Thunk.

 

Daffodil covered her ears.

“I didn’t kill him.” Charlie strode back in. “Wanted to, but didn’t.” He helped his mother to her feet. “You all right, Mum?”

“I’ll survive.” Marion winced, feeling a bruise rising on her temple. “But we need to have a serious talk when this is over, young man.”

“That’s exactly what I was going to say.”

“There’s probably one more goon out front.” Daffodil emerged from cover. “Pity you don’t have any special abilities, Chaz.”

“Not the time.” The boy checked his garden for any more intruders. “This way.”

“I am not sneaking out the back door of my own damned house.” Marion put both hands on her hips. “Besides, we need transportation.”

“We haven’t got a car any more, Mum.”

“I’m taking the green van that’s kept us under surveillance for the last few weeks.” She unfastened her apron. “And woe betide anyone who gets in my way.”

“So you did know we were being watched?”

“We’ve both been hiding things from each other, and it was a mistake.” Marion pushed the pair into the hall. “But all that will have to wait.”

“That woman’s a devil in a dress!” Daffodil punched Charlie on the arm. “Chaz, I really like your mom.”

 

It’s Only the End of the World by J . A Henderson is published by Kelpies Edge, priced £7.99

Not all rebels are worthy of admiration, and the fine people at Whittles Publishing have just released a book that shines a light on our more shadier exports. Murder, betrayal, slavery, unnecessary brutality – it’s no wonder these historical figures are largely swept under the carpet.

 

Between Daylight and Hell: Scots Who Left a Stain on America
Iain Lundy
Published by Whittles Publishing

 

The pioneer Scots who left their homes to settle in what were the New Lands of America faced challenges, dangers, and most of all, the perils of the unknown. They had to be intrepid, adventurous, and resourceful. This was the gamble of a lifetime and a spirit of rebelliousness was an essential part of the experience.

It’s well documented that many thousands of these people achieved astonishing feats – they were among the great and the good of American life. Others, however, took their ‘rebel’ side too far. Between Daylight and Hell: Scots who Left a Stain on American History tells the largely unknown stories of Scots who settled in America and left behind a legacy of disgrace. They used what talents they had to become rogues, charlatans, swindlers and, in some cases, killers.

Of the individual stories that are told in the book, there is one common thread: With one exception – the serial killer Thomas Cream who without doubt had multiple psychological and mental issues – none of these people had any need to behave the way they did. They have quite needlessly found themselves on a tablet of enduring shame for various reasons. Some were greedy, others brutalized their fellow human beings, while yet others allowed their bungling stupidity or hairstreak tempers to dominate their personalities.

There is nothing that attracts a rebel as much as a fight – and there was plenty of fighting and warfare in America’s early colonial days and beyond. Scots played a huge part in every conflict, from the French and Indian War through to the Revolution and the Civil War. In some cases, however, there must have been many who wished that certain of these men had stayed behind in Auld Scotia.

Adam Stephen was a highly successful Revolutionary War general, a friend of George Washington, and a son of the Aberdeenshire countryside who had carved out a respectable life for himself in colonial Virginia. When the Revolution came he fought alongside his new countrymen against the British. But Stephen’s wartime heroics came to an abrupt and embarrassing end.

He had developed a reputation for drinking heavily and his troops had noticed him consorting with “strumpets”. In October 1777, at the crucial Battle of Germantown, near Philadelphia, Stephen led his men into battle in such a drunken state that he ordered them to attack soldiers from his own side. Because of his disastrous actions, the battle was lost, and Stephen was cashiered from the army.

When the Civil War came along, another Scot, James Duff, was put in charge of a Confederate military unit known as Duff’s Partisan Rangers. His orders were to ‘persuade’ a group of German immigrants who were in no mood to fight against their adopted country that the Confederate cause was worth joining.

From being a businessman and part-time soldier, Duff became an absolute brute. He told his militia to kill and torture the Germans and burn and destroy their homes and possessions. Then, in one of the darkest events in Texas history, he ordered the killing of almost 40 fleeing Germans in what became known as the Nueces Massacre. He earned himself the moniker, ‘The Rebel Butcher of Western Texas’.

The slippery Charles Forbes swindled millions of dollars as head of the Veterans’ Bureau, a body created to provide aid to the soldiers returning from World War 1. He had been given a top job in the administration of President Warren Harding, yet he chose to defraud the US Government and paid for his misdeeds with a spell in prison.

David Jack also found himself in a position of responsibility in Monterey, California, shortly after America had taken control of the state from the Mexicans. He abused his position, evicted farmers and ranchers from their homes, and took possession of their lands. He had to travel with an armed escort because of threats on his life.

There are more stories, all in a similar vein: Mary Garden, the ungrateful and ungracious operatic diva who spurned her greatest benefactor; William Stewart, a bloodthirsty coward who butchered children to death during the shocking Mountain Meadows Massacre in Utah; and William Dunbar, a well educated son of the Scottish aristocracy who meted out brutal treatment to his negro slaves in America’s Deep South.

Most of these people had positions in life, at least in the society that was emerging in the developing new nation. There was no need for them to behave in such an unseemly way. The bottom line is that these adventurous pioneers, for reasons known only to themselves, let down the good name of Scotland. And they most certainly left a stain on the history of America.

 

Between Daylight and Hell: Scots Who Left a Stain on America by Iain Lundy is published by Whittles Publishing, priced £18.99

This weekend sees the centenary celebrations of Armistice Day. To commemorate this anniversary, BooksfromScotland are taking a look at children’s fiction that explores the First World War. Barrington Stoke have recently published Armistice Runner by Tom Palmer, a thought-provoking tale that sees Lily reconnect with her gran, who is suffering from Alzheimer’s, through the diaries of her great-great-grandfather. Tom Palmer tells us how he came to write his book.

 

Armistice Runner
By Tom Palmer
Published by Barrington Stoke

 

It’s hard to get children’s sports fiction published that is not about male football. So I was thrilled when Barrington Stoke accepted my first rugby book, Scrum. And thrilled, too, that it did well for me. As a result of having it published, I started getting invited into schools that love rugby. Barrington Stoke asked me for more. I wrote the Rugby Academy series.

So what next? Cricket? Swimming? Cycling? Athletics?

I’ve always enjoyed writing most about what I am obsessed with. Hence the football and rugby books. But the reason I don’t end up watching live football and rugby like I used to is to do with another sport altogether.

Fell running.

I like fell running. So does my daughter.

Up and down hills in settings like Yorkshire and Cumbria, fell running evolved from the tradition in village fetes to have a race up and down the nearest hill and to bet on who would win. As a result fell running is steeped in the history of places like Grasmere and Burnsall and throws up some great characters.

I’d been reading about fell running in three recent books – the most famous being Feet in the Clouds by Richard Askwith – and became fascinated with one such character, Ernest Dalzell. A game keeper, Dalzell would cycle from Kendal across the north of England to compete fell races. There was prize money. He usually won it. He came first in most of the classic fell races year after year and often ran at such pace that some locals thought he was cheating. But he wasn’t. His glory years led up to the year 1914.

Then history intervened. He went to war.

I became obsessed with Dalzell. I made a notebook with a picture of him on the cover. I wanted to find a way of writing a story about him. But I didn’t know how. It wasn’t until my daughter took up the sport three years ago that I found a way.

Armistice Runner is about a fell runner called Lily. She is 14 and about to take part in the biggest race of her life. Talking to her grandmother who is struggling with dementia, Lily finds out that her great-great-grandad was a champion fell runner called Ernest Darby. And that he served as a trench runner – running messages from officer to officer during the lead up to the armistice. Ernest Dalzell wasn’t a trench runner, but I imagine he would have been a good one if he had done it. He was killed in 1917.

In Armistice Runner the fictional Ernest Darby survives the war, but never runs the fells again, even though he returned without physical injury. No one in the family knows why. Until Lily finds his running logbooks. What she learns helps her both in her own race and helps her to cope with her grandmother’s failing memory.

Bless them, Barrington Stoke picked it up and agreed to publish it in time for this autumn’s centenary of the 1918 centenary.

 

Armistice Runner by Tom Palmer is published by Barrington Stoke, priced £6.99

This weekend sees the centenary celebrations of Armistice Day. To commemorate this anniversary, BooksfromScotland are taking a look at children’s fiction that explores the First World War. First up we have Gill Arbuthnott’s A Secret Diary of the First World War, inspired by the real life diary of a Scottish boy soldier. We asked her more about her writing process . . .

 

A Secret Diary of the First World War
By Gill Arbuthnott
Published by Young Kelpies

 

When did you begin to think about writing a book on the First World War?

I was approached in September 2017 by my publisher, Floris Books, to write this as the first in their Fact-tastic Stories history series. I had a long hard think about it, as it was so different from anything I’d done before – my other non-fiction has all been science based – but I think (hope!) that this ended up being an advantage, as I came to the project with no preconceptions and little knowledge – much like the children for whom it’s written.

How did you come across James’ story?

I’d done a lot of preparatory reading, but decided I needed to find a knowledgeable human who could answer my many questions, some of which were probably very stupid ones. I was put in touch with Col. Robert Watson of the Royal Scots, and he arranged for me to visit the Royal Scots Museum at Edinburgh Castle. When I got there, the staff told me about James Marchbank’s diary and let me listen to an interview with him recorded in 1976.

How did you feel when you finished reading James’ diary for the first time?

It was very moving to read what this young boy had gone through: he had basically grown up on the Western Front. I had assumed I would have to concoct a fictional diary from writings by underage soldiers, so to be shown the trench diary of a boy who had been called up in 1914, when he was only 14, (because he was already enlisted with the Territorials as a bugler) was quite extraordinary. I couldn’t quite believe that I’d been given access to such perfect material.

Aside from James’ diary, what other source materials and research were involved in preparing the book?

I read so many books that I lost count, visited museums, and contacted various people and organisations with specific questions. People were very generous with their time and expertise and I learned a tremendous amount from them that would have been difficult to track down otherwise. In particular, James’ grandchildren shared family photos and memories with me; I’m extremely grateful that they allowed me to use their grandfather’s story.

How important do you think knowledge of the First World War is for children today?

Enormously. Just because something took place a long time ago doesn’t mean it’s not important any more. Understanding how tensions between countries can escalate into war is always going to be extremely important if we’re to avoid it in the future, and learning to empathise with what others have experienced is, basically, what makes us human.

A Secret Diary does a really good job at tackling some difficult and poignant subject matter. Was it challenging to convey the hardest parts of the war to young children?

Definitely. I was walking a tightrope between making it so hard hitting that it would be too challenging for the target age group and glossing over the horror. It is possible to include some lighter detail, but it’s important not to do that too much. There’s no point in a book like this unless it really conveys the reality of what went on. Parts of it will be upsetting to read for some people, but we ought to find the reality of what happened upsetting.

The book contains lots of really engaging illustrations. How do you think illustrations can help to shape a child’s understanding of this kind of topic?

The illustrations are terrific. I was extremely lucky to get to work very closely with illustrator Darren Gate on this book. He found a way to deal with every challenge, from turning the real James into a cartoon and ageing him through the book, to showing injury and death without making it too graphic. Illustrations are a very good way of conveying the emotional impact of what was happening in the war, and of getting a lot of information over in a palatable way in a very limited number of pages. An annotated map is worth a thousand words!

How did you maintain the balance between fact and fiction when re-telling James’ story?

Everything in the book is factual. I combined extracts from different parts of James’ diary in order to fit with the theme of each chapter, but he was at all the locations and witnessed all the events mentioned – and he really did run into his brother in the middle of the battle of the Somme. I’ve changed the wording of the diary in some places, but James had a great turn of phrase, so I’ve tried to keep to the original where possible. My favourite is the understated ‘the air was a bit lively with bullets’ during a battle.

What can today’s school children learn from James’ experiences that they won’t find in a school textbook?

A school text book may give you all the facts, but it’s far harder for it to make an emotional connection with the reader. You can’t take in what 19000 deaths in one day of battle really means, but you can try to understand what one soldier feels like as shells explode around him, or he hears about the death of one of his friends. Secret Diary concentrates on one person’s true story, which helps the reader to imagine themselves in the situations James faced, and the fact that he was so young when he went to war makes it much easier for children to identify with him.

 

A Secret Diary of the First World War byGill Arbuthnott is published by Young Kelpies, priced £6.99

Just in time for Halloween, award-winning children’s author Ross MacKenzie gives us a run-down of his top five spooky books that continue to haunt him.

Ah, Autumn. For me, the season that conjures images of crisp mornings and endless sapphire skies. Trees the colour of fire. That unmistakable scent in the air (you know the one) – a heady mix of bonfires and frost and orange peel.

Halloween.

Darkness.

Creaking floorboards and moaning gales.

Tree branches scratching against the window pane of your bedroom in the dead of night.

Hungry dark things with claws and fangs, waiting in the shadows…

Blimey, things took a dark turn in a hurry there, didn’t they? Sorry about that.

There is definitely something about Autumn that throws my imagination into overdrive. I think this is probably true of many people. We all love a scary story, don’t we? And what better time of year for curling up in a comfortable chair and falling into the clutches of a terrifying tale?

With that in mind, I’ve selected five of my favourite spooky stories, both old and new, for you to enjoy this Halloween. So, get comfortable, lock the doors and remember: if you get too frightened, you can always close the book and shut it away in a drawer…

The Witches by Roald Dahl

This book, as I’ve often remarked, changed my life. It is the story that made me want to be an author. The Witches taught me that, by putting words one after the other on a page – and in the right combinations – it is possible to make people feel things. Dahl’s The Witches – the classic tale of a boy and his grandmother who find themselves suddenly up against every murderous, child-hating witch in England – took me on a magical journey and put my nine-year-old self through the emotional wringer. It’s deliciously dark and spooky, and features one of the most memorable villains I’ve ever encountered. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you… The Grand High Witch!

Coraline by Neil Gaiman

I was torn between this diamond and Gaiman’s other spooky masterwork for middle readers, The Graveyard Book. While both are modern classics, I’ve opted for Coraline because, quite simply, it’s terrifying.  Bored during the rainy summer holidays, little Coraline decides to explore the new (actually very old) house she’s recently moved into with her parents. Upon discovering a secret door, Coraline pushes through to find a house very much like her own, but with twisted, skin-crawling differences. This is a book about what it means to be brave, with characters and situations that will stay with you. As for the villain… Let’s just say there’s something about her eyes that will live long in your memory.

Doll Bones by Holly Black

This is the story of three friends and a haunted doll who claims to be made from the ground-up bones of a murdered girl. Yes, this is a children’s book. It may sound like the premise of some smash-hit horror movie, but in Holly Black’s safe hands the story maintains a great balance between creepy chills and the warm friendship between a group of children who find themselves thrust towards the realisation that childhood is coming to an end. Brilliantly scary in places, but also funny, with a dash of powerful nostalgia.

Riverkeep by Martin Stewart

One of my favourite young adult books of the past few years, Riverkeep is equal parts frightening, grotesque, darkly funny and deeply touching. Wulliam’s father is the stoic, ever-reliable keeper of a dangerous, unpredictable river until he falls foul of a demon and becomes a shadow of the man Wull has always loved and respected. Wull comes to believe that the only way to save Papa is to sail with him down the river and seek out the cure for his illness in the belly of an ancient monster. It’s a quest story at heart, but the sheer inventiveness of Stewart’s world-building, the rich quality of his writing and a cast of wonderful supporting characters take it to another level.

The Night Gardener byJonathan Auxier

A pair of orphans, a crumbling manor house, and a sinister gardener who enters the place unbidden each night to tend to a tree that seems to have a mind of its own. These ingredients, along with Auxier’s wonderful, evocative writing, make this a story that pulses with foreboding and dread. I found this to be the most frightening book on the list.  It is genuinely creepy – downright scary in parts – but the story is the sort that you feel the need to finish. And when you do, you’ll feel quite sure you’ve just done something brave.

 

Ross MacKenzie is the multi-award-winning author of the wonderfully imaginative The Nowhere Emporium and the fantastically spooky Shadowsmith.

His latest novel is The Elsewhere Emporium – the highly anticipated sequel to Blue Peter Book Award winner The Nowhere Emporium, available now from Kelpies (an imprint of Floris Books).

Anissa M. Bouzaine, author of Dune Song, tells us why she wrote her powerful debut novel.

Dune Song
By Anissa M. Bouzaine
Published by Sandstone Press

 

Sandstone Press are garnering plaudits for their international outlook in their commissioning, bringing readers in Scotland a fantastic array of writing from around the world. They have just published the debut novel by Anissa M. Bouziane, Dune Song, rooted in the author’s experience of witnessing the collapse of the Twin Towers. First published in French, the novel has gone on to win the Special Jury Prize, Prix Littéraire Sofitel Tour Blanche.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dik1mkkCOtI

 

Dune Song is published by Sandstone Press, priced £8.99

Any publication of new work by Alasdair Gray is a cultural event. And when Gray announced he was translating Dante’s epic The Divine Comedy, we’re sure BooksfromScotland were not the only ones on tenterhooks waiting for publication. The first part of the trilogy, Hell, is published this month, with Purgatory and Heaven to follow. We’re delighted to share with you the first canto.

 

Hell: Dante’s Divine Trilogy Part 1 Decorated and Englished in Prosaic Verse By Alasdair Gray
By Dante Aligheri & Alasdair Gray
Published by Canongate

 

1             In middle age I wholly lost my way,

finding myself within an evil wood

far from the right straight road we all should tread,

 

4             and what a wood! So densely tangled, dark,

jaggily thorned, so hard to press on through,

even the memory renews my dread.

 

7             My misery, my almost deadly fear

led on to such discovery of good,

I’ll tell you of it, if you care to hear.

 

10           I cannot say how I had wandered there,

when dozy, dull and desperate for sleep

my feet strayed out of the true thoroughfare,

 

13           till deep among the trees an upward slope

gave to my fearful soul a thrill of hope

as rising ground at last became a hill,

 

16           and looking up I saw a summit bright

with dawn – the rising sun that shows us all

where we should travel by its heavenly light.

 

19           This quieted a little while the fright

that churned the blood within my heart’s lagoon

through the long journey of that gloomy night.

 

22           Like shipwrecked swimmers in a stormy sea

who, tired and panting but at last ashore,

look back on swamping breakers thoughtfully,

 

25           I turned to view, though wishing still to leave,

the terrifying forest in the glen

no living soul but mine had struggled through.

 

28           My weary body rested then until,

rising, I climbed the sloping wilderness,

so that each footstep raised me higher still.

 

31           But see! The uphill climb had just begun

when suddenly a leopard, light, quick, gay

and brightly spotted, sprang before my feet,

 

34           dodging from side to side, blocking the way

so swiftly and with such determination

she sometimes nearly forced me to retreat.

 

37           The sun had reached a height dimming the stars

created with him on the second day,

after the birth of time and space and light,

 

40           and this recalled God’s generosity,

letting me feel some good at least might be

within the leopard’s carnival ferocity,

 

43           so dappled, bright and jolly was that beast,

but not so bright to stop me shuddering

at a fresh shock – a lion came in sight,

 

46           his mighty head held high, his savage glare

fixed upon me in such a hungry way

it seemed to terrify the very air.

 

49           A wolf beside him, rabid from starvation,

horribly hungry, far more dangerous,

has driven multitudes to desperation,

 

52           me too! For she established my disgrace,

(that worst of beasts) by killing my desire

to climb up higher to a better place.

 

55           A millionaire made glorious by gain

then hit by sudden loss of all he has,

cries out in vast astonishment and pain.

 

58           So did I, shoved down backwards, foot by foot,

by pressure of that grim relentless brute

till forced into the sunless wood again.

 

61           Appearing in its shade a human shape

both seemed and sounded centuries away,

murmuring words almost beyond my hearing,

 

64           therefore I yelled, “Pity and help me, please,

whether you be a living man or ghost!”

and pleaded, crouching down before his knees.

 

67           “Not man – though once I was, in Lombardy,

where both my parents dwelled in Mantua,

and I was born in Caesar’s reign,” said he,

 

70           “but educated in Augustan Rome

when the false gods were worshipped everywhere.

I sang the epic of Anchises’ son,

 

73           pious Aeneas, who fled blazing Troy

and founded Rome. I was a poet there.

Why are you here? Why turn back from your climb

 

76           towards the bright height of eternal bliss

and come again to a bad place like this?”

“You must be Virgil!” Awestruck, I replied,

 

 

79           “Fountain of all our pure Italian speech!”

Rising, I bowed and told him, “All I know

of poetry derives from what you teach!

 

82           The style which makes me famed in Italy

I learned from you who are my dominie!

Help me again, for see at the hill foot

 

85           the brute whose threats have rendered me distraught!

Master, please save me – show me the right way.

That rabid wolf has driven me so mad

 

88           my pulse and every sense have gone agley.”

I wept and, “Take another road,” he said,

“and leave this wasteland, leave that wolfish whore

 

91           who lets none pass before she bites them dead.

Her starving greedy lust is never sated.

Her appetite increases as she feasts.

 

94           Mated with many beasts, she’ll mate with more

till one great greyhound comes to hunt her down

whose fangs will end her life in deadly pain.

 

97           Wisdom, love, courage are his nourishment,

not gold nor land nor any earthly gain.

From birth among the lowly he will rise,

 

100        bringing new glory to the Italian plain

like the old Trojan colonists and kings

whose wars created Rome’s establishment.

 

103        Out of each city state he will expel

the wolf before he fixes her at last

back in the place she came from, which is Hell.

 

106        That is not yet; so now you’ll come with me

on a straight downward path into the jail

envy released her from, and see God’s wrath

 

109        afflicting sinners who forever wail –

no second death will end their agony!

Then a high fiery mountain we’ll ascend

 

112        past burning climbers, happy in their flame,

for they will one day join the heavenly choir.

The summit reached, since Heaven is your aim,

 

115        we two must part. A better guide than me

will lead you then. Living I did not know,

could not obey the last great law of He

 

118        who made the whole celestial universe.

His highest city, capital and throne

are places that I cannot hope to see.

 

121         Happy are those chosen to join Him there!”

I answered, “Poet, sent by the God whom you

(alas) can’t know, let us be gone, I pray,

 

124         out of this danger, down that hard, hard road,

then to the heavenly gate Saint Peter guards,

seeing the poor damned souls upon our way.”

 

127         We walked. I followed as he led me on.

 

 

Hell: Dante’s Divine Trilogy Part 1 Decorated and Englished in Prosaic Verse By Alasdair Gray is published by Canongate, priced £14.99