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Alex Linklater

@alexlinklater.bsky.social

Working title – "Antagonist: the life behind Hugh MacDiarmid" https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2344&context=ssl

50 Posts299 Follower134 Folgt
Association for Scottish Literature@asls.org.uk · 4mo ago

“At one moment when President Richard Nixon was taking part in his inauguration ceremony, he appeared flanked by Lyndon Johnson & Billy Graham… it was one of those historical coincidences which send a little shudder through the mind” George MacDonald Fraser, THE STEEL BONNETS (1971) #history 💙📚 4/6

At one moment when President Richard Nixon was taking part in his inauguration ceremony, he appeared flanked by Lyndon Johnson and Billy Graham. To anyone familiar with Border history it was one of those historical coincidences which send a little shudder through the mind: in that moment, thousands of miles and centuries in time away from the Debateable Land, the threads came together again; the descendants of three notable Anglo-Scottish Border tribes-families who lived and fought within a few miles of each other on the West Marches in Queen Elizabeth's time were standing side by side, and it took very little effort of the imagination to replace the custom-made suits with leather jacks or backs-and-breasts. Only a political commentator would be tactless enough to pursue the resemblance to Border reivers beyond the physical, but there the similarity is strong. Lyndon Johnson's is a face and figure that everyone in Dumfriesshire knows; the lined, leathery Northern head and rangy, rather loose-jointed frame belong to one of the commonest Border types. The only mystery is when the "" which distinguishes Border Johnstones from the others of the name was dropped from his surname. Billy Graham has frequently advertised his Scottishness, perhaps a little thoughtlessly, since there are more Grahams on the southern side of the line than on the northern, but again, the face is familiar. Richard Nixon, however, is the perfect example. The blunt, heavy features, the dark complexion, the burly body, and the whole air of dour hardness are as typical of the Anglo-Scottish frontier as the Roman Wall. Take thirty years off his age and you could put him straight into the front row of the Hawick scrum and hope to keep out of his way. It is difficult to think of any face that would fit better under a steel bonnet.Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon, & Billy Graham at Nixon’s inauguration, 20 January 1969. Photo: William C. Beall, Washington Daily News. Courtesy of the DC Public Library Washington Star Collection © Washington Post. Billy Graham stands at a podium, reading a text. His left hand grips the podium and his right is raised slightly in front of him, his hand clenched into a fist. Richard Nixon looks over Graham's right shoulder. Lyndon Johnson stands to Nixon's right. Other figures in formal dress stand, some with bowed heads.
Association for Scottish Literature@asls.org.uk · 4mo ago

George MacDonald Fraser (1925–2008) – author, historian, journalist, screenwriter – was born #OTD, 2 April, 1925. @michaeljecksauthor.bsky.social discusses GMF’s “dedication to strongly researched stories, built firmly on a bedrock of historical fact” 🎂🧵 💙📚 1/6 www.rlf.org.uk/showcase/not...

Not A Serious Writer

Novelist Michael Jecks investigates the historical realism of George MacDonald Fraser. Harry Flashman is a fictional character borrowed from a novel who purports to be telling the truth about real, hi...

rlf.org.uk

Alex Linklater@alexlinklater.bsky.social · 5mo ago

"Skeleton of the future" shurely? Red granite and black diorite, with the blue Of the labradorite crystals gleaming like precious stones In the light reflected from the snow; and behind them The eternal lightning of Lenin's bones.

Alex Linklater@alexlinklater.bsky.social · 5mo ago

Wonderful - unique - conversation between a French scholar-poet who writes in Scots and a Czech scholar-poet who writes in Gaelic. Paul and Petra provide a fresh European perspective on c20th Scotland, with beautiful recordings of Derick Thomson reading his poetry, and Petra hers

The Carrying Stream@thecarryingstream.bsky.social · 5mo ago

Dr Petra Johana Poncarová discussing how researching Gaelic literature inspired her own poetry in the language, mixing elements of Gaelic and Czech cultures and places. 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁳󠁣󠁴󠁿🇨🇿 Listen to the full interview by clicking on the link: pod.link/1865430519

Kirsti@kst.bsky.social · last yr.

R.S. Thomas was a 20th c Welsh poet & Anglican priest whose most famous poem, The White Tiger, uses the analogy of a tiger trapped in a cage for human perception of the divine-- "agonizing over immensities that will not return."

Association for Scottish Literature@asls.org.uk · last yr.

I hear your bold blackbird, that slow singer, alone at my desk yet walking with you through your valleys and hills, that shining stream bubbling notes of your music your pure Welsh music… —Sheila Templeton, “For R.S. Thomas” in A Little Touch of Cliff in the Evening: New Writing Scotland 30 #poetry

Sheila Templeton For R.S. Thomas I hear your bold blackbird, that slow singer, alone at my desk yet walking with you through your valleys and hills, that shining stream bubbling notes of your music your pure Welsh music. And I am walking behind my father, born in your time, but seeded in his own north land, ploughing, proud to stride behind his pair o horse; high cheek-boned, hair rain-flattened the colour of wet barley, speaking the secret words to his beasts, turning his park into a sea of order, yes, with your stiff clods glinting in the wind, gulls and peesie-weeps skirling encouragement; above him only a dark yearning sky. Another enduring ordinary man, born to till and toil, to win his wars to wrestle with his burning under those stars.
Alex Linklater@alexlinklater.bsky.social · last yr.

Richard Leonard (17.27.30) produces the most impressive MacDiarmidian rhetoric in this Holyrood motion. He repeats the myth that MacD was expelled from the National Party for being a communist but gets the splendidly mad tenor of the politics just right www.scottishparliament.tv/meeting/memb...

Members' Business — S6M-16290 Clare Adamson: MacDiarmid’s Brownsbank Cottage, a Scottish Cultural Treasure | Scottish Parliament TV

scottishparliament.tv

Association for Scottish Literature@asls.org.uk · 2y ago

Dear Ann, wherever you are Since you lately learnt to die, You are this unsetting star That shines unchanged in my eye… Born in Kirkwall, Ann Scott-Moncrieff was a friend of the Orkney poet & translator Edwin Muir, who wrote this poem for her when she died. 7/7

Edwin Muir FOR ANN SCOTT-MONCRIEFF (1914–1943) Dear Ann, wherever you are Since you lately learnt to die, You are this unsetting star That shines unchanged in my eye; So near, inaccessible, Absent and present so much Since out of the world you fell, Fell from hearing and touch— So near. But your mortal tongue Used for immortal use, The grace of a woman young, The air of an early muse, The wealth of the chambered brow And soaring flight of your eyes: These are no longer now. Death has a princely prize. You who were Ann much more Than others are that or this, Extravagant over the score To be what only is, Would you not still say now What you once used to say Of the great Why and How, On that or the other day? For though of your heritage The minority here began, Now you have come of age And are entirely Ann. Under the years’ assaults, In the storm of good and bad, You too had the faults That Emily Brontë had, Ills of body and soul, Of sinner and saint and all Who strive to make themselves whole, Smashed to bits by the Fall. Yet ‘the world is a pleasant place’ I can hear your voice repeat, While the sun shone in your face Last summer in Princes Street.
Association for Scottish Literature@asls.org.uk · 2y ago

Orcadian author Ann Scott-Moncrieff (1914–1943) was born #OTD, 11 January. Lesley Findlay, her daughter, talks about Ann’s life in Orkney, her writing, & her children’s stories – recently republished by Scotland Street Press 1/7 www.scotlandstreetpress.com/journal/who-...

Scotland Street Press | Who was Ann Scott-Moncrieff?

Lesley Findlay, daughter of Orcadian author Ann Scott-Moncrieff talks to Scotland Street Press about Ann’s life in Orkney, her writing and her Children's stories which have been republished as a colle...

scotlandstreetpress.com

Alex Massie@alexmassie.bsky.social · 2y ago

The January exhibition of Turner watercolours in Edinburgh is an annual treat. Made even lovelier this year because, for the first time, the national galleries of Ireland and Scotland have swapped their Vaughan bequests. New Turners!

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Alex Linklater@alexlinklater.bsky.social · 2y ago

Man, you rational folks on @bsky.app have been missing all the crazy shit on X-formerly-Twitter. Nigel just lost $100m by saying something sensible and Elon is having a globally public mental health episode and everyone is shrieking uncontrollably and nothing is happening in reality!

Alex Linklater@alexlinklater.bsky.social · 2y ago

The author who, more than any other British writer, defined the idea of literary academia: both its great intellectual dreams and its comic absurdities. It's a Smaller World now. Is the death of David Lodge a metaphor or a metonym? RIP

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Liam McIlvanney@liammcilvanney.bsky.social · 2y ago

Reading James VI and I’s Daemonologie. Seeing Macbeth everywhere: ‘And oftentimes, to win us to our harm, The instruments of Darkness tell us truths; Win us with honest trifles, to betray’s In deepest consequence…

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Alex Linklater@alexlinklater.bsky.social · 2y ago

Just as @mrewanmorrison.bsky.social was ahead of the field with pandemic fiction and novels about ideological capture, so he is the pioneer of AI literature in Scotland. Terrifying, engrossing, masterful. The most inventive and original writer we have.

Leamington Books@leamington.bsky.social · 2y ago

@ianrankin1.bsky.social old school cinematic trailer for FOR EMMA by Ewan Morrison launches on YouTube! Thank you so much for your support and early endorsement of this literary belter Ian. youtu.be/dgoa41NJkOU

Alex Linklater@alexlinklater.bsky.social · 2y ago

“Deep down in him there is something that comes from his roots in island Christianity.” (Free Kirk factionalism and the Disruption?) Excellent piece from @mikewadejourno - soon to leave @timesscotland, a loss to Scottish journalism. Ochone. www.thetimes.com/uk/scotland/...

Donald Trump’s Hebridean cousin: ‘I’m sure he’s lovely, deep down’

As the president-elect divides opinion globally, his relatives on the Isle of Lewis reflect on his Scottish heritage

thetimes.com

Alex Linklater@alexlinklater.bsky.social · 2y ago

Alexander Hamilton wrote nicely about the Senate's power to reject the president's "appointment of unfit characters,” including those “who had no other merit than that … of possessing the necessary insignificance and pliancy to render them the obsequious instruments of [the president’s] pleasure.”