There is a bunch of people living in a land just 66 miles south of Lanark. Their population is 10 times the size of the Scots. Our Parliaments have been joined since 1707. This strange, complex and fascinating lot are called ‘The English’. It’s not really contentious to say that we’re dominated by them in these […]
The English and Their History Read More »
The Bible (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bible) is the most widely distributed collection of literary texts in human culture. The Greek word βιβλία (biblía) means ‘books’. Its two parts, The Old and New Testaments between them comprise 66 books. This number itself is contentious because there is no one ‘Bible’. Different faith traditions have fixed their ‘canon’ of Scripture in different ways. It is nevertheless the
The Unauthorized Version by Robin Lane Fox Read More »
Alistair Moffat was born and bred in the Scottish Borders. A former Director of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe and Director of Programmes at Scottish Television, he now runs the Borders Book Festival. He is the author of a number of highly acclaimed books and is a former Rector of St. Andrews University. In this new single volume
In the period 2013-2015 The European Union has been desperately trying to prevent Greece from crashing out of the Euro. Bailout follows bailout. Why? It is a basket case of an economy saddled with a 320 billion Euro debt, a society mired in corruption from top to bottom, and with a hopelessly divided political class. For every
Introducing the Ancient Greeks by Edith Hall Read More »
Bettany Hughes (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bettany_Hughes) has been gracing our TV screens since 2012 presenting the history of the classical world. Her programme ‘Genius of the Ancient World – Socrates‘ (http://www.bbc.co.uk/mediacentre/proginfo/2015/32/socrates-genius-of-the-ancient-world) was broadcast on 12 August 2015 on BBC 4. Whether to follow up the programme or in preparation for a second viewing I would recommend her 2010 book The
The Hemlock Cup by Bettany Hughes Read More »
Lively interest in the Tudor and Elizabethan ages have been stimulated in recent years by the histories and popularisations of David Starkey (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Starkey) and Hilary Mantel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hilary_Mantel). Should you wish to immerse yourself further into this world you’ll find an excellent new book in God’s Traitors: Terror and Faith in Elizabethan England. The Catholics of Elizabethan England
God’s Traitors by Jessie Childs Read More »
A taste for the lurid, macabre and gruesome is not readily admitted in the Georgian drawing rooms of Lanark. On the outside chance that there is one person harbouring a furtive taste for some of life’s juicier details, let me introduce you to this work of history by Lisa Appignanesi (http://lisaappignanesi.com/), Trials of Passion. The author examines the
It’s an ingenious, if risky, premise to propose to tell the story of a single season in a single year that will somehow illuminate the character of a nation. Other years have their own popularity – 1922 as the ‘year of modernism’ perhaps, or 1963 as the year ‘sex began’ (according to Philip Larkin). Narrowing
One Summer: America 1927 Read More »
Dr. Neil MacGregor (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neil_MacGregor and http://www.britishmuseum.org/about_us/management/directors/neil_macgregor.aspx and ), http://www.theguardian.com/culture/2010/jan/02/neil-macgregor-british-museum-history Director of the British Museum, offers this sumptuous history of Germany through objects and art. Whilst Germany’s past is too often seen through the prism of the two World Wars, this book investigates a wider six hundred-year-old history of the nation through its objects. It examines the key moments that
Germany: Memories of a Nation Read More »
