Published in Scotland Magazine Issue 39 on 23/06/2008.

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Culture in the capital

Edinburgh is world famous for its festivals and its history. But it has a comtemporary artistic side too. Dominic Roskrow reports.

Followers of the British version of The Apprentice will be well aware that in the latest series Sir Alan Sugar’s two assistants have come in to their own.

Margaret and Nick have come out of their shells and are capable of stopping the contestants dead in their tracks with a withering look or sharply barbed criticism.

Watching Margaret in particular, all school ma’am prissiness and haughty aloofness, is as close as television gets to sadistic voyeurism and you’d feel guilty about enjoying the programme if the participants weren’t so cringingly appalling.

Recently, though, she stepped way over the mark. During a discussion on the intelligence of one of the contestants Nick observed that he must be intelligent because he’d been to Edinburgh University.

“It would seem that Edinburgh isn’t what it used to be,” Margaret observed, snobbily.

Although primarily aimed at the city’s educational standards, the comment was taken as a slight on Scotland’s capital in general. Nor was the irony of such a pointed criticism lost on those that know Edinburgh well, for it is often said that the citizens of the capital display the same sense of superiority towards the rest of Scotland, and indeed Britain, as Margaret displayed towards them.

But perhaps what made the comment most unacceptable is that it was just plain wrong. Edinburgh is as respected as it ever was and as a city it is thriving as never before.

Oddly, while Edinburgh has long claimed to be the premier city in Scotland throug.....

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By Dominic Roskrow

Section : Regional Focus

Page number : 32