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Underground > Books, Criticism & Writing >

A.L. Kennedy / young Scots writers?

alas

11:52 / 05.11.02

I'm working with a student who spent three weeks in Scotland and got hooked on young Scots writers, esp. A.L. Kennedy. Does anyone here know/ like her work?

2 Things I'd like from this Thread:
1) A general discussion of contemporary Scottish writing, of which I know very little, but should learn more if I'm to be of any bloody use to this student.
2) Any idea of resources she and I might look at to help us put them into perspective. I read the TLS for book reviews on a scattered basis. But, pardon me as I reveal my ignorance: is there a Scottish equivalent--a book-review resource that is centered in Scotland and would have longish reviews of contemporary writers?

eternally grateful, alas.

Ariadne

12:00 / 05.11.02

AL Kennedy is fabulous - I love her work. I'll look out some stuff for you when I get home tonight. Meanwhile, is Deva out there?

Ariadne

12:03 / 05.11.02

Somewhere to begin: http://www.britishcouncil.ru/britlit/scotintro.htm

(apologies for not linking, I never manage to get it to work)

Ariadne

12:13 / 05.11.02

The Scotsman's not bad for reviews of Scottish writing - there's a longish review here:

http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=1128612002&rware=MVXUMQXISAJW&CQ_CUR_DOCUMENT=4

You'll need to register.

Right, I'd better get back to work! More later.

Ariadne

12:15 / 05.11.02

Obsessive, me?

http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=873012002&rware=MVXUMQXISAJW&CQ_CUR_DOCUMENT=5

The Falcon

13:18 / 05.11.02

Alasdair Gray is probably my favourite Scottish novelist. I used to really like Iain Banks sci-fi stuff, his 'realist' stuff not so much, although 'The Wasp Factory' is disturbing and funny. He's probably the most popular contemporary Scottish novelist, I guess.

Bill Duncan's collection 'The Smiling School for Calvinists' was widely acclaimed as an excellent first novel (and he was my English teacher!) Don Paterson, who I've also met, is probably Scotland's leading modern poet. Nice guy, too. He says of Mr. Duncan's (sorry, habit!) book hat "it does for Dundee what Borges does for Buenos Aires". They are both Dundonians.

alas

14:06 / 05.11.02

thanks, all! Keep the suggestions coming! And thanks to Kit-Kat for the "Local Books for Local People" thread which provides the Guardian's list of books that best describe contemporary Scotland. I'd also be interested in your take on the Scots portion of that list.

cheers! alas.

Ariadne

14:27 / 05.11.02

I love that list! If you had time, it'd give you a pretty good picture of what's going on, culturally and in terms of Scottish writing.

If you need a shorter list, go for Gray, Lochead, Kelman. Alan Warner and Irvine Welsh (sp? too lazy to check) do the younger, harsher stuff well - and Welsh at least gives the East Coast side of things. Ooh, Alan Greig's good for that too - 'The Electric Brae' is fabulous. And Ali Smith is pretty good too. That's the problem with lists, they keep growing...

Ariadne

07:18 / 07.11.02

Make that Andrew Greig, not Alan. I'm sorry - I forgot, yet again, to look for links at home, but these look good:

http://www.slainte.org.uk/scotwrit/
http://www.kettillonia.co.uk/links.html

and I'd like to get hold of this - a history of Scottish writing by Alasdair Gray.

http://www.canongate.net/classics/clp.taf?_p=5951

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