Jessie Kesson

Jessie Kesson wrote for the Scots Magazine with the assistance of Neil Gunn and she also produced Women’s Hour on BBC radio. Her writing reflects the hardship of her own life, but the Daily Telegraph wrote, “Miss Kesson writes beautifully, her strong, delicate prose full of poetry and humour.

She wrote The White Bird Passes in 1958. Even though this novel has been adapted for television and Scottish poet has encouraged all to “beg, borrow or steal this book,” it gathers dust on library shelves.

Read this fine piece of literature before the bookwraith claims another victim.

The Lament of Flora McDonald

The Lament of Flora McDonald is one of Hogg’s most popular Jacobite songs and is featured on the University of Stirling’s research site studying James Hogg. This song was “first produced as a song sheet and later included in the Second Series of his Jacobite Relics in 1821. The tune and its accompaniment were written by Niel Gow junior, who apparently told Hogg that the melody was an ‘ancient Skye air’. Hogg is said to have written new lyrics for it, even though Gow provided original Gaelic verses, and Hogg was very proud of this song, noting in 1831: ‘I could hardly believe my senses that I had made so good a song without knowing it’. Its popularity is evident in a number of independent song sheets throughout the 1820s and ’30s. It also appeared in George Thomson’s Select Melodies of Scotland (1822), in The Border Garland (1828) and in Songs by the Ettrick Shepherd in 1831 where he calls it ‘Flora Macdonald’s Farewell’”. This quote is from the University site at http://www.jameshogg.stir.ac.uk/cd.php

and has MP3 files available for free download.

Can you find this song elsewhere? Your local library? Can you find it on Amazon.com? Will this song only be heard while this study of James Hogg endures then fade into the mist of time? Listen to this song and share it with your friends or the bookwraith will claim another victim.

The Songs of James Hogg

In 2005 Professor Emeritus Douglas Mack, at the University of Stirling and Dr Kirsteen McCue of Scottish Literature at the University of Glasgow were awarded a major research grant of just over £150,000 from the Arts and Humanities Research Council. This grant is allowing Dr McCue, and Dr Janette Currie also of the University of Stirling, to undertake a major project on the songs of James Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd.

This is alot of money to preserve the Jacobite songs of Hogg. Will this preserve them for generations to come? Have you seen any results from this grant? Some of the songs of Hogg's contemporary, Sir Walter Scott, are a part of our daily lives but we are not aware of his influence. Can you hum a tune of Hogg's?

James Hogg

James Hogg was born near Ettrick, Scotland in 1770. In 1824, he wrote The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner which Ian Crichton Smith considers, “a towering Scottish novel, one of the very greatest of all Scottish books.” This metaphysical thriller is the first psychological novel written a century before the genre became popular. It is a terrifying account of a psychopathic killer who abuses the Calvinist doctrine of predestination wherein God’s elect can do no wrong. Are God’s elect to live as they please as this character does?
Read the book if you can find it. Is it in your public library? It’s not in mine (I have my own copy, however). This is what happens to books when no one reads them. The Scottish literature and Scottish culture fades into the mist. One more book for the BookWraith.

Founding Brothers

Founding Brothers by Joseph Ellis gives a flesh and bone picture of some of the mythical individuals who laid the foundations of this country. I am concerned about the fact that no mention of the Scottish heritage of individuals like Alexander Hamilton is mentioned. Alexander Hamilton is one of the most influential Scots in American history. His father was Scottish and he himself was born in the British colony of Nevis, located in the West Indies. One of the main authors of the Federalist essays - instrumental in the forming of the Constitution - he became the first US Secretary of the Treasury. Hamilton developed an impressive and effective financial plan that created immediate faith in the government of a new nation. He is mentioned frequently when Tartan Day is celebrated. However, Tartan Day seems to be fading fast in the Scottish-American community as a cause for celebration. If books by Scottish authors are not read, they will disappear from the library shelves (Romance novels may be a pleasant diversion, but there are books of greater influence available). If those books disappear, new authors may be unaware of the Scottish heritage that influenced individuals like Alexander Hamilton.

Mollie Hunter

Mollie Hunter is, as I see her, Scotland's finest storyteller. I chose her for my bookwraith because her books sit on the library shelves gathering dust. Her books run the age gamut of children's fantasy to historical fiction for adults. Her fantasy books are rooted in Celtic folklore and the historical books bring to life Scotland's past. A Sound of Chariots and I'll Go My Own Way are my favorite young adult books. What are yours? Check them out at your library or they will be discarded and disappear into a Highland mist.

Makars

King James I belongs to a group of poets called Makars and described as Scots Chaucerians. This description is often criticized as denying the original nature of their poetry. These poets from Scotland were also influenced by earlier poets from Scotland like Barbour and also the courtly literature of France.
Since James Fenimore Cooper, Washington Irving and Nathaniel Hawthorne were influenced by Sir Walter Scott, perhaps they could be categorized as American Waverleys. ?