A ROBERT Cunninghame Graham Society is being formed to celebrate the writer, politician, and traveller, who made a notable contribution to modern Scotland through his involvement in the founding of both the Scottish Labour Party and the Scottish National Party.
. Alan MacGillivray pens an imaginative profile.
KING ROBERT IV
(When asked by a woman if it was true that he was the strongest claimant to the Scottish throne and might one day be King of Scotland, Robert Cunninghame Graham replied, "Yes, I believe that is true. And what a three weeks that would be!")
His brief benevolent despotic reign
Saw startling changes made throughout the land.
Blatant respectability was banned
(Except in Edinburgh); trips to Spain
And South America were added to
The school curriculum; a law was made,
Protecting discreet demi-mondaine trade;
All titles were abolished, any who
Maltreated horses were condemned to die,
The poor and sick received their rightful dues.
Such misrule gave offence. It came to pass,
One day he saw a guillotine dragged by
The Art Club window, knew he had to choose,
Lit out on horseback for the seas of grass,
Where, last was heard, an exiled king still moves,
Proud, noiseless, printless, upon unshod hooves.
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article