A Wee Guide To William Wallace

A pocket-sized biograpy of Scotland's greatest hero.

A deconstruction of the national biography and mythology of William Wallace. Freed from the historian's bedrock of empiricism by a lack of corroborative sources, the biography of this short-lived late-medieval patriot has long been incorporated into the i

This wide-ranging investigation probes traditional associations between the 'happy ending' and homogeneity, closure, 'unrealism', and ideological conservatism, testing widespread assumptions against the evidence offered by a range of classical and contemp

Reproduction of the original: Sir William Wallace by A. F. Murison

A pocket-sized guide that describes what is known about the history of the Picts, listing the best symbol stones and museums to visit with many illustrations and maps.

A pocket-sized biography of Robert Burns, including 25 places to visit related to his life, many of his renowned poems, and many illustrations.

A pocket-sized guide to Scottish history, and the dark deeds, battles, and political struggles involved. Details of over 200 historical places to visit are also included.

"The original story of the real braveheart, Sir William Wallace. Racy, blood on every page, violently anglophobic, grossly embellished, vulgar and disgusting, clumsy and stilted, a literary failure, a great epic." "Whatever the verdict on Blind Harry, this is the book which has done more than any other to frame the notion of Scotland's national identity. Despite its numerous 'historical inaccuracies', it remains the principal source for what we now know about the life of Wallace. The novel and film Braveheart were based on the 1722 Hamilton edition of this epic poem. Burns, Wordsworth, Byron and others were greatly influenced by this version 'wherein the old obsolete words are rendered more intelligible', which is said to be the book, next to the Bible, most commonly found in Scottish households in the eighteenth century. Burns even admits to having 'borrowed... a couplet worthy of Homer' directly from Hamilton's version of Blind Harry to include in 'Scots wha hae'." "Elspeth King, in her introduction to this, the first accessible edition of Blind Harry in verse form since 1859, draws parallels between the situation in Scotland at the time of Wallace and that in Bosnia and Chechnya in the 1990s. Seven hundred years to the day after the Battle of Stirling Bridge, the 'Settled Will of the Scottish People' was expressed in the devolution referendum of 11 September 1997. She describes this as a landmark opportunity for mature reflection on how the nation has been shaped, and sees Blind Harry's Wallace as an essential and compelling text for this purpose. Book jacket."--BOOK JACKET.