RITA DI SANTO draws attention to a new film that features Ken Loach and Jeremy Corbyn, and their personal experience of media misrepresentation
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Walter Scott: The father of the historical novel
On his 250th birth anniversary, JENNY FARRELL looks back at the life and work of the great Scottish writer
HOME FROM HOME: The early 16th-century Mailholm Tower in Scotland was where Walter Scott spent much time time during his youth
[Keith Proven/Creative Commons]
JULIA TOPPIN recommends Patti Smith’s eloquent memoir that wrestles with the beauty and sorrow of a lifetime
MARJORIE MAYO welcomes an account of family life after Oscar Wilde, a cathartic exercise, written by his grandson
KEN COCKBURN guides us through a survey of Chekov’s early short fiction, and the groundwork it laid for his later masterpieces
ANDY HEDGECOCK revels in a hugely enjoyable but deadly serious examination of the 1930s, that is an indictment of our own era
The bard distills our hellish times into fiery words
WALTER SCOTT, celebrated by Marxist critic Gyorgy Lukacs as the founder of the historical novel, was born in Edinburgh 250 years ago on August 15, 1771.
Born into the upper middle class, his family preserved a sense of tradition of one of the great Scottish clans. Like Rabbie Burns, Scott grew up with the songs and legends of Scotland, a cultural awareness that created a deep sense of national identity.
Scott’s collection Minstrelsy of the Scottish Border, a ballad anthology, made him famous. Besides writing, he was deputy sheriff of Selkirkshire, part-owner of a printing press and later a publishing house. Growing debts, however, impacted on his writing.
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