The power of fiction

As you read this, I will be preparing to give a talk at the Edinburgh International Book Festival. I'm in good company this year with Norman Mailer, Germain Greer, ANWilson, Alexander McCall Smith and Ian Rankin. For all of us who earn our living by the pen, or should I say word processor, it provides a splendid opportunity to be seen, heard and, more importantly, read.

What has become increasingly apparent, and wonderfully reassuring into the bargain, is that the written word is not only enduring, but increasing in popularity. There are now annual book festivals taking place in Aberdeen, Dundee, Kelso, Wigtown, and just over the Scottish Border at Sebergh, in Cumberland, all of them attracting top literary figures and capacity audiences. Independent Scottish publishers such as Birlinn and Cannongate are going from strength to strength.

On top of this, Edinburgh, the home of Sir Walter Scott, Robert Louis Stevenson and, more recently, Muriel Spark, J.K. Rowling and Irvine Welsh, has been nominated the first UNESCO World City of Literature. How about that?

Of course, every nation has successful writers, but Scotland is significantly fortunate in having its regional scribes – Lewis Grassic Gibbon for the Mearns (Aberdeenshire); James “Ossian” Macpherson, Neil Munro, Compton Mackenzie, Seton Gordon and Eric Linklater for the Highlands and Islands; James Hogg, John Buchan and Lavinia Derwent for the Borders, and for Glasgow, Jack House, with more recently James Kelman, T...

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• By : Roddy Martine
• In : Roddy Martine's World
• Issue : 34
• Page : 7
• Words : 814