Eggplant.place

22d

There they are, widows of the professoriate
Tied to their frail routines, but not unfree
Wheeling their shopping zimmers on Market Street;
And octogenarian still-cycling emeriti
Cautious of cobbles and slow-moving cars
Hunting for elusive parking spaces –
Physicists, medics, classicists, astronomers…

—Douglas Dunn, “Progress”
published in SECOND WIND (Saltire Society, 2015)

https://www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk/poem/progress/

#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry

Progress
Douglas Dunn

There they are, widows of the professoriate
Tied to their frail routines, but not unfree
Wheeling their shopping zimmers on Market Street;
And octogenarian still-cycling emeriti
Cautious of cobbles and slow-moving cars
Hunting for elusive parking spaces –
Physicists, medics, classicists, astronomers.
Gladly I yield to their seniority,
Their ancient tweeds, their wrinkled faces.
I would like to be a venerable sage,
And might be yet, if I can reach that age,
Nodding off over a Loeb in the Library
Half-way through a forgotten declension,
Defeated, yet again, by Livy’s prose.
But I gave up my bike ten years ago,
Terrified of traffic on the A91 –
And that was on the pavement. I suppose
That so-called ‘progress’ overtakes us all –
Superfast fibre, electronic bravado.
Where will it end? That’s what I want to know.
It’s years since I saw an icicle.

ALT

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

147d

The Battle of Waterloo was fought #OTD, 18 June, 1815. Walter Scott visited the battlefield shortly after; his 1816 book PAUL’S LETTERS TO HIS KINSFOLK contains one of the earliest accounts of the aftermath, & is an important early example of war journalism

1/3

https://theconversation.com/walter-scott-war-journalism-from-the-waterloo-battlefield-43304

#Scottish #literature #Waterloo #history #19thcentury #journalism #WalterScott

1 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

78d

“The life of John Buchan reads like one of his adventure stories… he roamed both continents & careers alike, leaping from one cliffhanger to the next”

John Buchan (1875–1940) – from son of the manse to Governor-General of Canada – was born #OTD, 26 August.

A 🎂 🧵

1/9

https://www.thebottleimp.org.uk/2025/12/the-reign-of-saturn/

#Scottish #literature #JohnBuchan #20thcentury

2 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

53d

“I found more than 30 anonymous poems. So many of them immediately struck me as being by women, about female themes, & written in a female voice. And I certainly wasn’t expecting to find lesbian love poetry”

—Ashley Douglas explores Marie Matland’s 16th-century Scottish sapphic verse

https://thecoldmagazine.co.uk/theatre-literature/meet-the-scottish-lesbian-poet/

#Scottish #literature #poetry #loevepoetry #manuscript #16thcentury #renaissance #earlymodern #queerliterature #queerpoetry #sapphic #lesbian #LGBTQ

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

55d

The bell that tolls my syllables can tell
An underwater tale, clang how there fell
Suddenly out of a surface shouting world
Into dumb calm doomed children…

—George Sutherland Fraser (1915–1980), “S.S. City of Benares”

On 18 September, 1940, at one minute past midnight, the SS CITY OF BENARES was torpedoed in the Atlantic. Of 134 passengers, 90 were child refugees bound for Canada. Only 13 children survived.

#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #WarPoetry #WW2 #refugees

George Sutherland Fraser
S.S. City of Benares
(Drowned refugee children, 1940)

The bell that tolls my syllables can tell
An underwater tale, clang how there fell
Suddenly out of a surface shouting world
Into dumb calm doomed children, and there curled
(Currents’ sick fingers whispering at their hair)
Round them a coiling clutch, was our despair.
Sea’s soft sad pressure, like the sprawl of love,
Darkly spreadeagled, so they could not move,
The wide wet mouth was heavy, they would choke,
Till in that cold confusion pity spoke:
“This is a nightmare and one is asleep.
This is a dream, my brave one, do not weep,
Often may drown in dreams and not be dead:
Such weight is mother leaning on your bed.”

But having thought of this to cheat my pain,
That woe and wonder harrows me again,
Fat clouds seem bulked like whales, while through the green
Grave tons of twilight, in a submarine
Solidity of air like sea I move,
Pressure of horror how our hate hurts love.
Deeper than grief can plummet, mercy lies,
But not so deep as trust in children’s eyes,
Justice is high in heaven, but more high
Blood of the innocent shall smear the sky—
Or think that red the flame of seraph wings,
See stained-glass heaven, where each darling sings
In God’s dark luminous world of green and gold
As lovely as death’s waters, but less cold:
Think what you will, but like the crisping leaf
In whipped October, crack your thoughts to grief.
In the drenched valley, whimpering and cold,
The small ghosts flicker, whisper, unconsoled.

ALT

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

55d

A Blether o Books: Scotland through Literature
7–8 November, Robert Burns Birthplace Museum, Alloway

Tickets are on sale for the third annual Blether o Books, held at the Robert Burns Birthplace Museum.

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/cc/a-blether-o-books-scotland-through-literature-4179073/

#Scottish #literature #books #bookfestival

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

55d

Sar Sgeoil: GREENVOE
Currently on BBC iPlayer. In Gaelic with English subtitles

George Mackay Brown’s 1972 novel GREENVOE imagines an Orkney island community threatened by a mysterious defence project. Cathy MacDonald investigates the story & its themes.

1/3

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m001kb81

#Scottish #literature #novel #Orkney #GeorgeMackayBrown #Gaidhlig #Gaelic

1 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

108d

Whare hae ye been sae braw, lad?
Whare hae ye been sae brankie, O?
Whare hae ye been sae braw, lad?
Came ye by Killiecrankie, O?

—“Killicrankie”, from James Hogg’s JACOBITE RELICS OF SCOTLAND (1819).

The Battle of Killiecrankie ⚔️ was fought #OTD, 27 July, 1689. A Jacobite force led by Ewan Cameron of Lochiel & Viscount Dundee defeated a Scottish government army commanded by Hugh Mackay

#Scottish #literature #EarlyModern #17thcentury #battle #Jacobite #song #folksong

Page images from James Hogg’s JACOBITE RELICS OF SCOTLAND (1819). Musical notation is supplied for the chorus: the full text of the song is also given:

Whare hae ye been sae braw, lad?
Whare hae ye been sae brankie, O?
Whare hae ye been sae braw, lad?
Came ye by Killiecrankie, O?

CHORUS:
An ye had been whare I hae been
Ye wadna been sae cantie, O;
An’ ye had seen what I hae seen,
I’ the braes o’ Killiecrankie, O

I faught at land, I faught at sea,
At hame I faught my auntie, O;
But I met the Devil and Dundee
On the braes o’ Killiecrankie, O
An ye had been, &c.

The bauld Pitcur fell in a furr,
And Clavers gat a clankie, O,
Or I had fed an Athol gled
On the braes o’ Killiecrankie, O.
An ye had been, &c.

Oh fie, Mackay, what gart ye lie
I’ the brush ayont the brankie, O?
Ye’d better kiss’d King Willie’s loof,
Than come to Killiecrankie, O.
It’s nae shame, it’s nae shame
It’s nae shame to shank ye, O;
There’s sour slaes on Athol braes,
And deils at Killiecrankie, O.

ALT

1 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

77d

Call for Applications: Crossing Tongues Poetry Residency

Edinburgh UNESCO City of Literature invites a Scottish poet writing in English, Scots &/or Scottish Gaelic to undertake a 7-day residency in Nigeria, alongside the Hausa International Book & Arts Festival, December 2026

Applications open until 30 September

https://cityofliterature.com/opportunities/call-for-applications-crossing-tongues-poetry-residency/

#Scottish #literature #poetry #Nigeria #Scots #Scotslanguage #Gaidhlig #Gaelic #residency

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

77d

NAMING THE SNAKES: New Writing Scotland 44
Glasgow launch
8 September, Waterstones Sauchiehall St, Glasgow – £5 / £12 with book

Celebrate the latest issue with a mix of readings of poetry, short fiction & non-fiction in English, Gaelic & Scots – all welcome!

https://www.waterstones.com/events/new-writing-scotland-44-launch/glasgow-sauchiehall-street

#Scottish #literature #Gaidhlig #Gaelic #Scots #Scotslanguage #poetry #shortfiction #shortstories #booklaunch #writingcommunity #Glasgow

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

29d

Diving in the warm seas around Bearsden,
cased in our superchitin scuba-gear,
we found a world so wonderfully clear
it seemed a heaven given there and then…

—Edwin Morgan, “Carboniferous”
published in CENTENARY SELECTED POEMS (Carcanet, 2020)

A time-travelling science-fiction poem for National Fossil Day

https://www.carcanet.co.uk/9781784109967/centenary-selected-poems/

#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #Bearsden #Glasgow #EdwinMorgan #fossil #fossils #NationalFossilDay #sciencefiction #scifi #scifipoetry

Edwin Morgan
Carboniferous
For I.R.

Diving in the warm seas around Bearsden,
cased in our superchitin scuba-gear,
e found a world so wonderfully clear
it seemed a heaven given there and then.
Hardly! Et in Arcadia, said the shark,
ego. We stumbled on a nest of them.
How could bright water that hid nothing stem
our ancient shudder? They themselves were dark,
but all we saw was the unsinister
ferocious tenderness of mating shapes,
a raking love that scoured their skin to shreds.
We feared instead the force that could inter
such life and joy, in fossil clays, for apes
and men to haul into their teeming heads.

ALT

2 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

54d

On leaving
you playfully punched
my left
shoulder.

The sensation
remains

But your
voice fades

The sensation
remains
But your
image fades

I
short of breath
tremble

I think
you’ve
cracked
a
rib.

—“Gone but Not Forgotten”, by Maud Sulter (1960–2008), born #OTD, 19 September – a 🎂🧵

1/11

#Scottish #literature #poem #poet #poetry #photography #MaudSulter #BPOC #Blackwriters #womenwriters #Scotland #Ghana

ALT

1 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

54d

Today, 19 September, is Batman Day. You’d think there would be a signal or something but

Anyway, here’s “Batman’s Aff His Nut”, by Robert Florence

https://mothdancepoetry.wordpress.com/2018/10/13/batmans-aff-his-nut-by-robert-florence/

#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #Glasgow #comics #comicbooks #Batman #BatmanDay

Batman’s aff his nut
Robert Florence

Batman’s aff his nut
Have you seen the way he cuts aboot
Dressed up as a mad fuckin bat
Batterin guys
I was lit at:
“Mate, I’m worried aboot ye
I know your ma and da died
But everybody’s ma and da dies
And we’re no aw runnin aboot
Hookin muggers and
Kickin psychopaths in the baws.”
And that was when Batman went
“Aye, but do ye ever feel like it?
Do you ever look at the world and feel like it?
Like having a big mad base under your hoose?
Do you ever feel like drivin a big mad motor
that turns intae a tank?
And leatherin fuck oot of guys aw night?
Scarin the fuckin shite oot of them?”
And that’s when I was lit at:
“Aye. Fuck it. Ah dae.”
And that’s the Secret Origin of Robin
And everyone else.

ALT

Blurry photo of a man (possibly a stunt-double?) in a (partial?) Batman costume, on a wet Glasgow street – probably taken during the filming of the 2022 movie THE BATMAN, where Glasgow was a stand-in for Gotham City.

Text: She’s turned the Waynes against us…

She’s turned the Waynes against us

ALT

1 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

77d

In Conversation: Callum McSorley

“I read THE CUTTING ROOM by Louise Welsh and everything clicked into place. Here was Glasgow, as I knew it but also totally different. Welsh had created a Glasgow that had all the glamour and seediness of hardboiled LA. This is what I wanted to write.”

Callum McSorley in conversation with Sindhu Rajasekaran about writing crime fiction & sequels, & his latest novel RAT RACE.

https://www.thesubjectivespace.com/callum-mcsorley

#Scottish #literature #crimefiction #Glasgow #TartanNoir

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

54d

“Newton had a way of making everyone in the movie react to him like astonished children, agog at the snarling, bug-eyed, peg-legged creature in their midst”

Today is #TalkLikeAPirateDay – but really it’s #TalkLikeRobertNewtonPlayingLongJohnSilverDay 🏴‍☠️🦜

1/2

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/film-version-treasure-island-gave-us-our-image-pirates-180967149/

#Scottish #literature #TalkLikeAPirateDay #RobertLouisStevenson #TreasureIsland #film #FilmHistory

2 0 1 View Post & Replies See Original

76d

nuair a tha mi fhìn nam sheasamh
aig ceann Loch an Dala
’s mi a’ coimhead thar cuain geur
a’ deàrrsadh ’s a’ deàlradh
fo ghrian na sìorraidheachd
chan fhaic mi sgath dhen ghlasadh cheilteach…

—Iain S. Mac a’ Phearsain, “ceann Loch an Dala”
published in Friends & Kangaroos: New Writing Scotland 17

#Scottish #literature #Gaidhlig #Gaelic #poem #poetry #Islay

ceann Loch an Dala
Iain S. Mac a’ Phearsain

nuair a tha mi fhìn nam sheasamh
aig ceann Loch an Dala
’s mi a’ coimhead thar cuain geur
a’ deàrrsadh ’s a’ deàlradh
fo ghrian na sìorraidheachd
chan fhaic mi sgath dhen ghlasadh cheilteach
a’ ciaradh Ile
na eilean shìthichean faoin
ach soitheach mo shinnsearan
a’ triall dhan iar
Gilleasbaig is Eòghann
a’ cur cùl ri Cill’ Nèimh
an aghaidh leis a’ ghaoith
’s an làmhan air a’ chliathaich
blàth ’s cha mhòr air chrith.

ALT

head of Loch Indaal
John Scott MacPherson

personally, when I stand
at the head of Loch Indaal
and look out
over a razor-sharp sea
shining and radiating
under an everlasting sun
I see none of the Celtic twilight
reducing Islay
to an island of vacant faeries
but my ancestors’ ship
heading for the west
Archibald and Hugh
turning backs on Kilnave
facing downwind
their hands on the gunwhales
warm and almost shaking.

ALT

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

76d

A boy leaves a small house
Of sea light. He leaves
The sea smells, creel
And limpet and cod.

The boy walks between steep
Stone houses, echoing
Gull cries, the all-around
Choirs of the sea…

—George Mackay Brown, “Island School”
published in Carve the Runes: Selected Poems (Polygon 2021)

https://birlinn.co.uk/product/carve-the-runes/

#Scottish #literature #Orkney #poem #poetry #GeorgeMackayBrown #backtoschool

Island School
George Mackay Brown

A boy leaves a small house
Of sea light. He leaves
The sea smells, creel
And limpet and cod.

The boy walks between steep
Stone houses, echoing
Gull cries, the all-around
Choirs of the sea,

Ship noises, shop noises, clamours
Of bellman and milkcart.
The boy comes at last
To a tower with a tall desk

And a globe and a blackboard
And a stern chalk-
smelling lady. A bell
Nods and summons.

A girl comes, cornlight
In the eyes, smelling
Of peat and cows
And the rich midden.

Running she comes, late,
Reeling in under the last
Bronze brimmings. She sits
Among twenty whispers.

ALT

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

22d

Creating a Sense of Place with Len Pennie & Peter Mackay
28 October, Lochaber High School, Fort William. Free, ticketed

Join Scotland’s Makar Peter MacKay & acclaimed poet Len Pennie, hosted by Dr Conner McAleese, for a conversation about the people, places & experiences that shape their writing.

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/creating-a-sense-of-place-with-peter-mackay-and-len-pennie-tickets-2002710363609

#Scottish #literature #poetry #place #FortWilliam

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

75d

I pulled all my mother’s expectations
with me, like a child’s kite, giddy with stir
of spring…

—Lynn Valentine, “St Kilda Crossing”
from DON’T. EVEN. ASK. TOO. HOT.: New Writing Scotland 42 (ASL, 2024)

Today, 29 August, marks the 96th anniversary of the final evacuation of St Kilda.

https://asls.org.uk/publications/books/newwriting/nws42/11111

#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #StKilda

ST KILDA CROSSING
by Lynn Valentine

I pulled all my mother’s expectations
with me, like a child’s kite, giddy with stir
of spring. Because she was cancer-cracked
I turned tourist by proxy, crouched into cleits
looking for leavings of last century.

I photographed fawn smallness of Soays
felt the crash of wind-whipped stacs,
my pockets salt-filled. I leant
on those islands as my mother leant on me,
filled my lungs with their breeze
and leaping green language of sea.

I tried to hold my breath for days,
took it back to my mother, exhaled
island air on her weakened frame –
whispered broken stories of birds and rain.

ALT

1 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

52d

Chalk Scribblers: Meet the Author
7 October, 7–9pm BST, free online

An evening with leading science-fiction novelist Charles Stross @cstross

Charlie will open with a reading from his latest novel, The Regicide Report, which concludes The Laundry Files which started in 2006 with The Atrocity Archives.

@bookstodon

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/chalk-scribblers-meet-the-author-charles-stross-tickets-2000172679327

#Scottish #literature #scifi #sciencefiction #CharlesStross #LaundryFiles

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

75d

Word of Mouth: Gaelic
Currently on BBC Sounds

Poet Michael Rosen in conversation with Gaelic language expert Roddy Maclean about the status of Gaelic in Scotland.

Among the facts Michael picks up is that Gaelic has no single word for Yes or No & that the landscape of the Highlands can be better understood by understanding the origin of Gaelic place names. He also gets to hear some of his work performed in Gaelic by Glasgow schoolchildren.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sounds/play/m0030n9z

#Scottish #Gaidhlig #Gaeilc

m0030n9z

0 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

52d

Call it not vain:—they do not err,
Who say, that when the Poet dies,
Mute Nature mourns her worshipper,
And celebrates his obsequies…

—from Canto V, “The Lay of the Last Minstrel” by Sir Walter Scott (1771–1832) – died #OTD, 21 September

https://www.theotherpages.org/poems/canto05.html

#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #WalterScott #19thcentury #romanticism

Sir Walter Scott
The Lay of the Last Minstrel
Canto V

I.
Call it not vain;—they do not err,
Who say, that when the Poet dies,
Mute Nature mourns her worshipper,
And celebrates his obsequies:
Who say, tall cliff and cavern lone
For the departed Bard make moan;
That mountains weep in crystal rill;
That flowers in tears of balm distill;
Through his lov'd groves that breezes sigh,
And oaks, in deeper groan, reply;
And rivers teach their rushing wave
To murmur dirges round his grave

II.
Not that, in sooth, o'er mortal urn
Those things inanimate can mourn;
But that the stream, the wood, the gale
Is vocal with the plaintive wail
Of those, who, else forgotten long,
Liv'd in the poet's faithful song,
And with the poet's parting breath,
Whose memory feels a second death.
The Maid's pale shade, who wails her lot,
That love, true love, should be forgot,
From rose and hawthorn shakes the tear
Upon the gentle Minstrel's bier:
The phantom Knight, his glory fled,
Mourns o'er the field he heap'd with dead;
Mounts the wild blast that sweeps amain,
And shrieks along the battle-plain.
The Chief, whose antique crownlet long
Still sparkled in the feudal song,
Now, from the mountain's misty throne,
Sees, in the thanedom once his own,
His ashes undistinguish'd lie,
His place, his power, his memory die:
His groans the lonely caverns fill,
His tears of rage impel the rill:
All mourn the Minstrel's harp unstrung,
Their name unknown, their praise unsung.

ALT

1 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

52d

The Battle of Prestonpans was fought #OTD, 21 September 1745. The first major engagement in the Jacobite rebellion, Prestonpans was a stunning victory for the (mostly Highland) troops under Charles Edward Stuart. The song “Johnnie Cope”, composed very shortly afterwards, probably by Adam Skirving, exists in numerous versions & arrangements – including one by Beethoven – but it is originally a pipe tune.

1/3

#Scottish #literature #bagpipes #music #song #18thcentury #Jacobite #battle

Jonnie Cope

Second Set

To the foregoing air

Cope sent a challenge frae Dunbar,
Sayin “Charlie meet me an’ ye daur;
An’ I’ll learn ye the airts o’ war,
If ye’ll meet me in the morning.”
Hey! Johnnie Cope, are ye waukin’ yet?
Or are your drums a-beating yet?
If ye were waukin’ I wad wait,
Tae gang tae the coals i’ the morning.

When Charlie looked the letter upon,
He drew his sword its scabbard from,
“Come, follow me, my merry men,
And we’ll meet Johnnie Cope i’ the morning.”
Hey! Johnnie Cope, &c.

“Now Johnnie, be as gude’s as your word,
Come, let us try baith fire and sword,
And dinna flee like a frighted bird,
That’s chas’d frae its nest i’ the morning.”
Hey! Johnnie Cope, &c.

When Johnnie Cope he heard o’ this,
He thought it wadna be amiss
To have a horse in readiness,
To flee awa i’ the morning.
Hey! Johnnie Cope, &c.

“Fy now, Johnnie, get up an’ rin;
The Highland bagpipes make a din,
It’s best to sleep in a hale skin,
For ’twill be a bluidie morning.”
Hey! Johnnie Cope, &c.

When Johnnie Cope to Dunbar came,
They speer’d at him, “Where’s a’ your men?”
“The de’il confound me gin I ken,
For I left them a’ this morning.”
Hey! Johnnie Cope, &c.

“Now Johnnie, troth ye wasna blate,
Tae come wi’ the news o’ your ain defeat,
And leave your men in sic a strait,
Sae early in the morning.
Hey! Johnnie Cope, &c.

“I’faith”, quo’ Johnnie, “I got a fleg
Wi’ their claymores an’ philabegs,
If I face them again, deil break my legs,
So I wish you a gude-morning.”
Hey! Johnnie Cope, are ye waukin’ yet?
Or are your drums a-beating yet?
If ye were waukin’ I wad wait,
Tae gang tae the coals i’ the morning.

ALT

1 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

74d

“…my habitual residence was on the blank and dreary northern shores of the Tay, near Dundee…”
—Mary Shelley, introduction to FRANKENSTEIN (1831 edn)

Mary Shelley (1797–1851) was born #OTD, 30 August. Prof Daniel Cook examines why Scotland mattered so much to Mary Shelley, & considers Shelley’s position in the Scottish Gothic tradition

@litstudies

https://www.nls.uk/papercut/mary-shelley-and-the-scottish-gothic-tradition/

#Scottish #literature #gothic #horror #Dundee #MaryShelley #Frankenstein #FrankensteinDay

1 0 0 View Post & Replies See Original

74d

The blind man did not hate me.
I saw him through the window,
through the rippling circle my own
hot breath had melted
in the spiky flowers of the frost…

—Liz Lochhead, “2. What the Creature Said”, from DREAMING FRANKENSTEIN & Collected Poems 1967–1984 (Birlinn, 2011)

https://birlinn.co.uk/product/dreaming-frankenstein-2/

#Scottish #literature #poem #poetry #Frankenstein #FrankensteinDay