‘Enlightenment in a Smart City, Edinburgh’s Civic Development, 1660-1750’ by Murray Pittock (Edinburgh University Press) ‘Edinburgh in the 1950s, Ten Years that Changed a City’ by Jack Gillon, David McLean…
The curious case of Gordon Brown Leading article Kenneth Roy Is the former PM a man of straw or a man of destiny? Also: Kenny MacAskill Bonus-go-round The economy Alf…
‘The Cultural Memory of Georgian Glasgow’ by Craig Lamont (published by Edinburgh University Press) I begin by confessing that I have found this quite short, but very expensive book, somewhat…
‘Beyond the Thirty-Nine Steps, A Life of John Buchan’ by Ursula Buchan, (Bloomsbury Publishing) I find on one of my bookshelves a little book with the following flyleaf inscription in…
‘Scotland’s Populations from the 1850s to Today,’ by Michael Anderson (Oxford University Press) This is an important book, by a professor of economic history at the University of Edinburgh. But…
CULTURE War paint Books of the month: Andrew Hook Sketch by Fred Farrell A Chasm in Time, Scottish War Art and Artists in the Twentieth Century, by Patricia R Andrew,…
Andrew Hook The whole world is at fever pitch over the World Cup. Or so we were told before it began. Now that it has kicked off, a very different…
I was lucky enough to spend Christmas and New Year in Genoa. Years ago, when the children were young, we regularly spent seaside holidays in Monterosso Al Mare in the…
I am a member of the Labour Party but not a very active one. However in early August, I was surprised to receive an email from an individual in my…
‘Abbotsford to Zion, The Story of Scottish Place Names Around The World’, Elspeth Wills (Birlinn) Reading Elspeth Wills’s book reminded me of a reaction I had to something I’d recently…