Walking the hill country around my Aberdeenshire home, my feet seek tracks to follow, ways that have already been made plain. Animal tracks direct me to water, guide me through a bog, or along the firmest contours of a slope. But the human pathways through the hills are more compelling – the old drove roads, Read More
In 2003, when Simon Jenner took up the reins of the long-established Survivors Poetry, there was tacit acceptance in some quarters that he was there to ensure that the organization’s death throes were fairly painless – except that Jenner was not complicit in that acceptance. Nor were the Chair, John O’Donoghue, or ACE (Arts Council Read More
An edited transcript… JS: Bill Herbert, thank you for agreeing to this interview for Dundee University Review of the Arts and congratulations on being appointed Dundee’s Makar. So, it’s obvious what my opening query’s going to be – what does this mean, that you’re going to be Dundee’s Makar? What are you going to have Read More
“How can it possibly work – a book describing a film, more or less shot by shot?” asks Tess Hadley, author of The London Train (2011), in response to Geoff Dyer’s Zona: A Book About a Film About a Journey to a Room. And indeed it shouldn’t. A thorough account of Tarkovsky’s 1979 film Stalker, Read More
Stuart Kelly is a literary journalist and critic with a formidable reputation for his innovative thought on literary and cultural matters, not only in Scotland, but throughout Britain. He has judged the Man-Booker Prize, the Granta Best Young Novelists of the Year and is one of the judges for the 2014 Dundee Book Prize. He Read More
Back in October, I caved in to temptation and read A.A. Gill’s review of this book. It concluded: This is a book that cries out like one of [Morrissey’s] maudlin ditties to be edited. But were an editor to start, there would be no stopping. It is a heavy tome, utterly devoid of insight, warmth, Read More
One was immediately given some idea of Lesley Riddoch’s character when the audience was told that she arrived straight from a hospital visit some 40 miles away in Kirkcaldy. In fact, such was Riddoch’s warm humour and enthusiasm in the session that it was easy to forget that you were listening to one of the Read More
As we approached the final event of Dundee Literary Festival 2013, we charged our glasses and toasted 40 years of Canongate. Originally founded by Stephanie Wolf Murray, Canongate was brought back from the brink in 1994 by current publisher and managing director, Jamie Byng, who is now still at the helm of the company. At Read More
“Research is the fascinating bit [of writing historical fiction] but you have to get rid of a lot of it.” Clearly, a lot of what was not used for the writing of Unfashioned Creatures, was used during the book launch in what felt more like a lecture than a promotional event. Whilst the “lecture” was Read More
Unfortunately, as sometimes happens, the previous event ran over the allotted time and the session with Sarah Hall and Ruth Thomas was delayed by twenty minutes. It was unfortunate not only because waiting around is the last thing anyone enjoys doing, but because the discussion hosted by Peggy Hughes, the Dundee Literary Festival director, was Read More