Scotlands of the Mind

About the Book: 

Does Scotland as a "nation" have any real existence? In Britain, in Europe, in the World? Or are there a multitude of multiform "Scotlands of the Mind"? These soul-searching questions are probed in this timely book by prize-winning author and journalist, Angus Calder. It is a journey through many possible Scotlands - fictionalised, idealised, and politicised. This perceptive and often highly personal writing shows the scope of Calder's analytical power. Fact or fiction, individual or international, politics or poetry, statistics or statehood, no subject is taboo in a volume that offers an overview of the vicissitudes and changing nature of Scottishness.#

Reviews:

Calder writes like your conscience would THE GUARDIAN

About the Author:

ANGUS CALDER has been best known as a social and cultural historian. The People’s War: Britain, 1939-45 has been almost continuously in print since it appeared in 1969. Other substantial historical books followed, and two collections of essays about Scotland, past and present. But he has also published verse all his life, won a Gregory Award in 1967, and was convenor of the Committee which helped Tessa Ransford realise her vision of a Scottish Poetry Library in 1984. Since he took early retirement from the Open University in Scotland in 1993, he has written poetry more prolifically, and published widely.

His three previous collections are Waking in Waikato (1997), Colours of Grief (2002) and Dipa’s Bowl (2004). Receipt of a Scottish Arts Council Writers Bursary in 2002 gave him gave him breathing space to organise his uncollected verse.