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Jackie Kay, Trumpet (1998), Marie Hologa Dec 2017

Jackie Kay, Trumpet (1998), Marie Hologa

Studies in Scottish Literature

Argues that Kay's acclaimed novel about a celebrated black jazz trumpeter, who is transgender, presents "an alternative construction of masculinity to the stereotypical Scottish 'hard man' of tartan noir, " dealing with "questions of identity that go beyond Scottishness," and unmasking "the emptiness of normative categories like gender, sexuality, ‘race’ and ethnic origins in a postmodern ... society."


Robin Jenkins, The Thistle And The Grail (1954) With A Comment On Sunset Song, David E. Latane Dec 2017

Robin Jenkins, The Thistle And The Grail (1954) With A Comment On Sunset Song, David E. Latane

Studies in Scottish Literature

Recommends Robin Jenkins's story of a Scottish football (soccer) team, Drumsagart Thistle, and its quest to win the Scottish Junior Cup, as "a marvelous compendium of Roy of the Rovers improbabilities, Our Town ethnography, critiques of gender relations, subtle and broad satire, and laugh outloud comedy."


Writing On The Margins: Luke Sutherland, Venus As A Boy (2004), Manfred Malzahn Dec 2017

Writing On The Margins: Luke Sutherland, Venus As A Boy (2004), Manfred Malzahn

Studies in Scottish Literature

Recommends Sutherland's "epiphanic" short novel, which received rave reviews on publication, as a novel that should have been "an almost mandatory selection" for the BBC poll ballot, suggesting that it was excluded, not only because of length, explicit language, and violence, but because its island setting and depiction of "the fuzzy margins of sexual and racial identity" made it wrongly seem peripheral to the Scottish "mainland and mainstream."


Books Noted And Received, Patrick Scott Dec 2017

Books Noted And Received, Patrick Scott

Studies in Scottish Literature

Short reviews and brief notices of twenty-one recent books in Scottish literary studies.


The Crème De La Crème: Old Favourites, New-Fangled Works, And Other Fictions, Willy Maley Dec 2017

The Crème De La Crème: Old Favourites, New-Fangled Works, And Other Fictions, Willy Maley

Studies in Scottish Literature

Introduces the SSL Debate, in which 18 contributors react to and add to the BBC Scotland poll on Scotland's Favourite Novel, discussing the purposes and limitations of various lists that have ranked recent Scottish fiction, and commenting briefly on the differences between this debate and the deliberations of a selection panel.


Eric Linklater, Private Angelo (1946), Gill Plain Dec 2017

Eric Linklater, Private Angelo (1946), Gill Plain

Studies in Scottish Literature

Recommends Linklater's novel about World War II in Italy as "a book that cherishes national difference while utterly condemning nationalism," "as much a book for 2017 as it was for 1946," and "a sharply observant satire dissecting the male vanity, national hubris and hypocrisy behind the 'logic' of war."


Willa Muir, Imagined Corners (1931), Timothy C. Baker Dec 2017

Willa Muir, Imagined Corners (1931), Timothy C. Baker

Studies in Scottish Literature

Recommends Muir's novel (which came in 30th in the BBC poll), set in a small Scottish town and concerned with "'the ideology of Scotland,' and questions of class, religion, sexuality, politics, and education," as "indisputably a great novel, perhaps equalled in British fiction only by To the Lighthouse, and utterly unique in the Scottish canon,"


James Robertson, The Fanatic (2000), Silvia Mergenthal Dec 2017

James Robertson, The Fanatic (2000), Silvia Mergenthal

Studies in Scottish Literature

Suggests that Robertson's first novel, chiefly concerned with 17th century Scotland, already shows the complex intertextual relationships with earlier Scottish works by Scott, Hogg, and Stevenson that marks his subsequent writing, and comments particularly on its question "What happens later?," in relation to the Scottish vote for political devolution in May 1997.


Nan Shepherd, The Quarry Wood (1928), Carole Jones Dec 2017

Nan Shepherd, The Quarry Wood (1928), Carole Jones

Studies in Scottish Literature

Recommends Shepherd's novel about an independent woman in north-east Scotland as "vivid in delineating its female central character, its local language, and what is undoubtedly a radical engagement with sexual politics," that "examines closely issues of sexual identity and gender relations, and ... comes to its own thoughtful conclusions on women's place in the world."


Muriel Spark, The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie (1961), Katrin Berndt Dec 2017

Muriel Spark, The Prime Of Miss Jean Brodie (1961), Katrin Berndt

Studies in Scottish Literature

Discusses Spark's well-known novel, recognizing its "curious amalgamation of acerbic humour, elegance of style, Calvinist spirit, and careful poignancy of plot development," but pointing also to "the pleasurable challenge" offered by its "charismatic" protagonist, Jean Brodie, "glamorous and romantic," "with a proud self-assurance rarely bestowed on female characters," which nonetheless "eludes everyone’s emotional grasp."


Regaining Control: Jenni Fagan, The Panopticon (2012), Marie-Odile Pittin-Hedon Dec 2017

Regaining Control: Jenni Fagan, The Panopticon (2012), Marie-Odile Pittin-Hedon

Studies in Scottish Literature

Discusses Fagan's groundbreaking novel about an Edinburgh teenager as "an important landmark of contemporary literature," "a performative act of resistance ... over the forces of oppression," and "an invitation to reconsider the ethics of our contemporary world."


A New Dimension Of Scottishness? Iain Banks, The Algebraist (2004), Martin Procházka Dec 2017

A New Dimension Of Scottishness? Iain Banks, The Algebraist (2004), Martin Procházka

Studies in Scottish Literature

Argues that Iain Banks's experimental science fiction, often disguised as the pop-culture genre of “space opera,” changes the frame of reference for Scottishness, linking it with a plurality of fictitious worlds, presenting the gradual erosion, subversion and deconstruction of the anthropomorphic perspective, to reveal the limitations of humanist ideologies.


Scotland’S Top Ten & The Inadequacy Of A National Canon: Alasdair Gray’S Lanark (1981), Scott Lyall Dec 2017

Scotland’S Top Ten & The Inadequacy Of A National Canon: Alasdair Gray’S Lanark (1981), Scott Lyall

Studies in Scottish Literature

Discusses the healthy overlap in the recent BBC Scotland poll on Scotland's Favourite Novel between popular appeal and critical recognition; judges Gray's Lanark as "Scotland's greatest modern novel," which "deserves to be much better known internationally," as "the outstanding postmodern challenge to the global conformism of capitalist hyper-individualism," laments that, despite their usefulness, such curated polls and lists are self-perpetuating, to the neglect of many distinctive Scottish novels, and concludes by asking "what would a truly uncurated top 30 look like?"


James Robertson, Joseph Knight (2003), Ilka Schwittlinsky Dec 2017

James Robertson, Joseph Knight (2003), Ilka Schwittlinsky

Studies in Scottish Literature

Recommends Robertson's novel, based on the true story of the Jamaican slave who in 1778 successfully asserted his freedom in the Scottish Court of Session, and the intertwined story of John Wedderburn, the Scottish plantation owner whose slave he had been, as "an eminently enjoyable historical novel which tackles a difficult subject matter [Scotland’s complicity in slavery and the slave trade] with astonishing humanity."


'It Is To Pleasure You': Seeing Things In Mackenzie's 'Aretina' (1660), Or, Whither Scottish Prose Fiction Before The Novel?, Rivka Swenson May 2017

'It Is To Pleasure You': Seeing Things In Mackenzie's 'Aretina' (1660), Or, Whither Scottish Prose Fiction Before The Novel?, Rivka Swenson

Studies in Scottish Literature

Examines the early novelistic fiction, Aretina (1660), by the Scottish lawyer Sir George Mackenzie of Rosehaugh (1636-1691), and explores the ways in which it appeals to the senses, so that readers "flesh out the contours of contextualized character according to their own personal predilections."


'A Thin And Tattered Veil': Lewis Grassic Gibbon And The Church Of Scotland, Ian Campbell May 2017

'A Thin And Tattered Veil': Lewis Grassic Gibbon And The Church Of Scotland, Ian Campbell

Studies in Scottish Literature

Discusses the changes in Scottish religious practice and adherence from just before the First World War, through to the early 1930s, through the representation of the Church of Scotland in Lewis Grassic Gibbon's Scots Quair trilogy: Sunset Song (1932), Cloud Howe (1933), and Grey Granite (1934), with briefer comment on other writings by the same author writing as J. L. Mitchell. and a final comparison between Gibbon's portrayal of religious change and that in an earlier Scottish novel, John Galt's Annals of the Parish(1821).


Writing Scotland's Future: Speculative Fiction And The National Imagination, Timothy C. Baker Nov 2016

Writing Scotland's Future: Speculative Fiction And The National Imagination, Timothy C. Baker

Studies in Scottish Literature

Explores the fictional treatment of future Scotlands in the wake of the 2014 Referendum, through discussion of varied speculative novels or stories by Graham Dunstan, Paul Johnston, Ken Macleod, Matthew Fitt, Julie Bertagna, Momus, Andrew Crumey, A.L.Kennedy, Michael Faber, and Sarah Hall, arguing that "the relation between Scottish literature and Scottish politics is more complex than is often thought," that "rather than simply commenting on current political situations, much contemporary Scottish fiction offers a rethinking of politics entirely," and that "Scotland’s future is not, and cannot be, confined to a single narrative."


Recovering The Reformation Heritage In George Mackay Brown's Greenvoe, Richard Rankin Russell May 2016

Recovering The Reformation Heritage In George Mackay Brown's Greenvoe, Richard Rankin Russell

Studies in Scottish Literature

Suggests that attitudes to Presbyterianism and the Scottish Kirk in much 20th century Scottish literary criticism have been too negative, and explores the religious heritage and selected writings of the Orcadian poet and novelist George Mackay Brown (1921-1996), a Catholic convert, to argue that Brown's best-known novel, Greenvoe (1972), draws not only on Catholic, and older pagan, symbolism, but also on aspects of the Reformed or Calvinist tradition.


James Hogg's The Brownie Of Bodsbeck: An Unconventional National Tale, Barbara Leonardi May 2016

James Hogg's The Brownie Of Bodsbeck: An Unconventional National Tale, Barbara Leonardi

Studies in Scottish Literature

Discusses James Hogg's historical novel The Brownie of Bodsbeck (1818), set in the time of the religious Covenanters in late 17th century Scotland, with particular attention to the central woman character, Katharine Laidlaw; traces contemporary comment on the novel; and contrasts Hogg's distinctive portrayal of marriage with its use by other writers (particularly Scott) to plot national (and historical) reconciliation, arguing that Hogg uses the marriage plot to critique the emergent ideology of the national tale.


Sir Walter Scott's The Monastery And The Representation Of Religious Belief, Chad T. May Dec 2015

Sir Walter Scott's The Monastery And The Representation Of Religious Belief, Chad T. May

Studies in Scottish Literature

Examines Sir Walter Scott's novel The Monastery, written while he was also working on his better-known medieval novel Ivanhoe, and discusses its representation of the historical religious transition of Scotland from a Catholic to a Protestant country; focuses especially on Scott's treatment of the supernatural, in the figure of the White Lady, and argues that Scott uses her to allow representation of a personal religious experience or religious vision that otherwise fitted uneasily with his generally secular project for historical representation in fiction; and concludes by briefly sketching the significance of this atypical, transitional novel for understanding religious …


John Stuart Blackie's Altavona: A Late Victorian Reaction To The Highland Clearances, Brooke Mclaughlin Mitchell Dec 2015

John Stuart Blackie's Altavona: A Late Victorian Reaction To The Highland Clearances, Brooke Mclaughlin Mitchell

Studies in Scottish Literature

Reviews the career of John Stuart Blackie (1809-1895), poet, professor successively of humanity in Aberdeen and of Greek in Edinburgh, and a tireless advocate for the Scottish Highlands and Celtic culture; sketches his growing criticism of Highland landlords and the eviction of crofters from Scottish estates, in relation to more recent perspectives; and discusses his successive literary treatments of the Clearances in his "Highland Sonnets," his long poem "The Highlander's Lament," and, most fully, in his 'novel' or mixed-genre prose work Altavona: Fact and Fiction from My Life in the Highlands (1882), commenting also on Blackie's revisions to the book …


'I Am Not Writing Anything Just Now': A Letter From Walter Scott To Sarah Smith, February 13, 1814, John T. Knox Dec 2015

'I Am Not Writing Anything Just Now': A Letter From Walter Scott To Sarah Smith, February 13, 1814, John T. Knox

Studies in Scottish Literature

Describes and reproduces a letter written by Sir Walter Scott to the actress Sarah Smith (later Mrs Bartley), in February 1814, in which he tells her shortly before the anonymous publication of his novel Waverley that "I am not writing anything just now"; discusses Scott's interest in Smith's career, his brief comments on the dramatist Joanna Baillie, and the extent to which Smith was in his confidence about his writing.


George Mackay Brown’S “Celia”: The Creative Conversion Of A Catholic Heroine, Linden Bicket Nov 2014

George Mackay Brown’S “Celia”: The Creative Conversion Of A Catholic Heroine, Linden Bicket

Studies in Scottish Literature

Compares the early manuscript and published text of a short story "Celia," by the Scottish Orcadian writer, poet, and Catholic convert George Mackay Brown (1921-1996), to examine the depiction of alcoholism in the story, the influence of Graham Greene, and Brown's softening or repression of his original explicit Catholic themes and imagery when revising the story for publication.


“The Future Of The Planet”− Scottish Cosmopolitanism/ Cosmofeminism And Environmentalism In Theresa Breslin’S Saskia’S Journey, Fiona Mcculloch Nov 2014

“The Future Of The Planet”− Scottish Cosmopolitanism/ Cosmofeminism And Environmentalism In Theresa Breslin’S Saskia’S Journey, Fiona Mcculloch

Studies in Scottish Literature

Discusses major themes and concerns in the young adult novel Saskia's Journey, by Theresa Breslin, with special attention to the relation between Breslin's environmental themes (and Scottish setting) with her portrayal of the novel's central character and multigenerational family relationships.


Regina Hewitt, Ed., John Galt: Observations And Conjectures, Anthony Jarrells Nov 2014

Regina Hewitt, Ed., John Galt: Observations And Conjectures, Anthony Jarrells

Studies in Scottish Literature

Review of collection of scholarly essays on the Scottish novelist and poet John Galt (1779-1839), who was also a pioneer in Canadian fiction.


A Century Of Scottish Creative Writing: Three Essays, Maurice Lindsay Jan 2007

A Century Of Scottish Creative Writing: Three Essays, Maurice Lindsay

Studies in Scottish Literature

No abstract provided.


Stepping Back To An Early Age: James Hogg's Three Perils Of Woman And The Ion Of Euripides, David Groves Jan 1986

Stepping Back To An Early Age: James Hogg's Three Perils Of Woman And The Ion Of Euripides, David Groves

Studies in Scottish Literature

No abstract provided.