Ten books...which give a haggis-lite taste of life in Edinburgh down the centuries
Ten books...which give a haggis-lite taste of life in Edinburgh down the centuries
As the Festival starts to swing, take time out from the theatricals to explore the capital's fictional credentials.
1. Magnus Merriman by Eric Linklater
A wee chancer, the eponymous MM dreams not only of greatness for himself but for Scotland too. He is - as one critic noted - "a figure of fun who feels completely at home in a nation notoriously slow to see the joke". Seeking to win a parliamentary seat, he is both a Scottish Nationalist and a Conservative who believes that communism, pacifism and socialism are all forms of perversion. Some very funny moments - if only there were more of them.
1. Heart of Midlothian by Sir Walter Scott
Great novel; if only one could say the same of the football team! Effie Deans is accused of child murder and sentenced to death but her sister Jeannie is determined to save her life. Gripping stuff.
1. The Existential Detective by Alice Thompson
William Blake is the titular sleuth asked to investigate the case of a missing woman. Portobello, with its brothels, nightclubs and amusement arcades, is his beat. Any resemblance to city's seaside resort is, of course, utterly without foundation.
4. And the Land Lay Still by James Robertson
Fifty years of Scottish life as seen through the lens of Angus Pendreich, a posthumous exhibition of whose work his son Michael is curating for the National Gallery of Photography. Impressively ambitious and wonderfully evocative.
1. The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie by Muriel Spark
With not a single misplaced comma and containing more witty one-liners than all the stand-ups on the Fringe can muster, Spark's "milch cow" is as perfect a novel as you will find. For once 'genius' is the only word that will do.
1. Trainspotting by Irvine Welsh
Set in the midst of "the Hibs worst season ever" (until the one just past that is), Welsh's story of drug-addled, foul-mouthed losers and junkies is like being blasted with halitosis. Astonishingly, it won no prizes; in a better world it would have at least been given an ASBO.
1. 44 Scotland Street by Alexander McCall Smith
First published serially, it describes life at an imaginary address in a real New Town street, where the men wear red corduroys and the women make Maggie Thatcher look shy and retiring. Here be yahs. Wodehouse would have loved it.
1. Carotid Cornucopius by Sydney Goodsir Smith
Praised by Hugh MacDiarmid as "doing for Edinburgh no less successfully what Joyce did for London", SGS's outrageously comic 1947 novel must rank as one of the most neglected of the twentieth century. Nor is that likely to change if it remains out of print.
1. Knots & Crosses by Ian Rankin
It may not be the best of the Rebus books, but it was the first. A murderer is on the loose and the fabled detective is dumfoonert and drinking more than is good for him. Auld Reekie in the heyday day of fur coats and nae knickers.
1. Debatable Land by Candia McWilliam
Ostensibly set on a sail boat as it travels from Tahiti to New Zealand, McWilliam's brilliant and beguiling third novel is more concerned with Edinburgh and Scotland - from where three of its six crew hail - than it is the South Seas. Read, then re-read.
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