The questions that In Ascension poses, and the incredibly discoveries made, ask the reader to deeply consider that old cliche: we are all made of star stuff. One of Sir Walter Scott’s best-known and most influential works of literature, Ivanhoe, tells the knight Ivanhoe’s epic story and his adventures through medieval England and to the Holy Lands. This Scottish novel tells the stories of heroic battles, romance, and historical events. It should be on every history buff’s ‘must-read’ list! What futures can we project for devolution today? In one sense, the political strategy became redundant in 2011, when it failed to prevent the open challenge to the legitimacy of the United Kingdom represented by the 2014 referendum. In another, the result of that referendum – 2 million votes against Scottish independence – was a ringing endorsement of devolution and proof both of its popularity and its durability as a ‘settled’ constitutional position. (This point was strongly made at our 2015 workshop by legal scholar – and Unionist/Conservative campaigner – Adam Tomkins.) Having spectacularly failed to ‘kill nationalism stone-dead’, in the famous 1990s prophecy of George Robertson, ever-further devolution is the maximalist middling way most popular with the Scottish public (see Curtice 2014), and serves as the basis for not one but two imminent strengthenings of the Scottish Parliament (the implementation of the Scotland Act 2012 and further new powers recommended by the Smith Commission in 2014). Simultaneously beefed-up and obsolete, devolution is being asked to mean most things to most people as never before. Dizzying . . . subtle and profound . . . And The Land Lay Still reads like an alternative history of Scotland told by its everyday people instead of its movers and shakers . . . eminently readable ( Independent on Sunday)

Its findings, eventually published in the 1973 Kilbrandon Report, set the process of Scottish devolution into deliberately retarded motion. Powerful and moving. A brilliant and multifaceted saga of Scottish life in the second half of the twentieth century ( Sunday Times) If you do nothing, you will be auto-enrolled in our premium digital monthly subscription plan and retain complete access for 65 € per month. Ali Smith is a literary genius who once again gives her readers an unforgettable, mind-bending story. Centred around a Renaissance painter in the 1460s and the child of a child in the 1960’s, the story weaves between the two tales of love and injustice and twists into a single thread. In contrast, Alex Thomson offered a sceptical view of national literary history and its critical methods, so often employed to justify the canon (and discipline) in ways which tend to inhibit critical enquiry:This is easily one of the most impactful and important queer Scottish books in years, by a powerful voice amongst transgender authors. Scottish International promoted itself as a magazine for the development of a radical critique of culture and society, experiment being very much at the heart of it. Just as Bob Tait was giving up the magazine he wrote that ‘basically I’ve seen this magazine as a kind of exploration vehicle, getting as far as possible into the depths, some of them murky, of the society and culture within viewing range.’ [… ] In tracing these magazines and debates, we can discern a fierce reaction to insularity at the start of the 1960s, but as we move through to Scottish International there’s still a very sceptical vision of cultural nationalism and the pitfalls of being too entrenched within certain forms of national identity. There’s a passionate focus on Scotland but also a deep suspicion of complacent ways of thinking about identity. ( Recording, Workshop 1) And the Land Lay Still - covers major transformations that have taken place in Scottish society over the past 60 years

Home> Fiction from Scotland> And the Land Lay Still And the Land Lay Still By (author) James Robertson The definition of a cult classic, Irvine Welsh’s Trainspotting, is one of the most well-known Scottish books. Following the turbulent lives of a group of boys who both do terrible things and experience terrible things, Trainspotting is a masterpiece of authentic writing and paints a tragic portrait of its characters’ lives.Powerful and moving. A brilliant and multifaceted saga of Scottish life in the second half of the twentieth century' Sunday Times