Scottish Literature

What do we mean by ‘Scottish literature’?
Why does it matter?
How do we engage with it?

Bringing infectious enthusiasm and a lifetime’s experience to bear on this multi-faceted literary nation, Alan Riach, Professor of Scottish Literature at the University of Glasgow, sets out to guide you through the varied and ever-evolving landscape of Scottish literature.

A comprehensive and extensive work designed not only for scholars but also for the generally curious, Scottish Literature: an introduction tells the tale of Scotland’s many voices across the ages, from Celtic pre-history to modern mass media. Forsaking critical jargon, Riach journeys chronologically through individual works and writers, both the famed and the forgotten, alongside broad overviews of cultural contexts which connect texts to their own times. Expanding the restrictive canon of days gone by, Riach also sets down a new core body of ‘Scottish Literature’: key writers and works in English, Scots, and Gaelic.

Ranging across time and genre, Scottish Literature: an introduction invites you to hear Scotland through her own words.

Reviews: 

Obviously indispensable; I am learning new facts and possibilities on every page. NEAL ASCHERSON

It takes women and men of prodigious faculty to advance the institution of a National Literature. NIYI OSUNDARE

The presiding spirit over this book is Hugh MacDiarmid… STUART KELLY

Scottish Literature: An Introduction, Alan Riach’s magnum opus, is all that the term implies. It is encyclopaedic, refreshing, personal and yet detached, and it has provoked me into buying Gavin Douglas’s Aeneid, The Eneados, which is a bloody good read, as is the book that prompted its purchase! JOHN PURSER

Alan Riach’s Scottish Literature: An Introduction is excellent – incredibly comprehensive! I think it is pitched at exactly the right level for the audience it’s aimed at. I’m already well into it and am looking forward to reading the whole book. RONALD RENTON

Magisterial THE TIMES

A magnum opus/tour de force/labour of love, its impressively encyclopaedic range and lucid attention to detail are irradiated by a heart-warming enthusiasm for the subject. It conveys both the grandeur of a mountain, and the exhilaration of the climb. STEWART CONN

Scottish Literature: An Introduction is ‘in a class of its own’ with ‘many happy provocations… Riach is a poet and a serious and intuitive, voracious, intellectual. The mirror to his mind, his writing sings and bustles with energy and daring. It ranges far and wide across the arts, nationally and internationally, and rallies the reader to be bolder… This is surely a work destined to be a landmark in Scotland’s literary history, for all time, a classic at a critical moment in its subject’s destiny. ANDREW McNEILLIE, THE NATIONAL

I’ve been going through Scottish Literature: An Introduction with delight, marvelling at the way you have of stating things so accessibly. You’re a gift to the reader, and your prose never gets stodgy and clunky. Your proselytising zeal is exactly what Scottish literature needs. Your refusal to bow not just to Anglocentrism but to the Anglo-Saxon supremacism of those who promote Scots only at the expense of Gaelic is a credit to you. And I really appreciated the helpful anti-elitism of your approach. The 101 places chapter rounds things off beautifully and in a most unexpected way. PATRICK CROTTY, EMERITUS PROFESSOR OF IRISH AND SCOTTISH LITERATURE, UNIVERSITY OF ABERDEEN

I am just rolling up to the final pages of your book. I have relished every page and feel excited and energised by it. DAVID HARDING, ARTIST

I am very much enjoying your guide to Scottish literature. I dip in and out and find myself learning (many) things I didn't know and having some of my assumptions and judgements confirmed but some challenged too. DAVID HUTCHISON, PROFESSOR IN MEDIA POLICY

Scottish Literature: an introduction is a huge achievement and a great treat for all of Scotland. HELEN BELLANY, ARTIST

Congratulations. Scottish Literature: an introduction is terrific, a significant book for Scotland and the wider world. It’s a mighty tome, yet the language trips along lightly with great ease for the reader, refreshingly accessible, and packed with fascinating treasures. It’s so inclusive, setting up a feeling of community by frequently quoting other voices and creating a rounded and hugely positive sense of Scotland as a nation. A marvellous depth and breadth of literature is presented, always within a political and cultural context. This is a book that should be on shelves all over the world. GERDA STEVENSON

About the Author:

ALAN RACH was born in Airdrie in 1957. He studied English literature at Cambridge University from 1976-79. He completed his PhD in the Department of Scottish Literature at Glasgow University in 1986. His academic career has included positions as a post-doctoral research fellow, senior lecturer, Associate Professor and Pro-Dean in the Faculty of Arts, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand 1986-2000. He returned to Scotland in January 2001 and is currently the Professor of Scottish Literature at the University of Glasgow.