The Weatherhouse

The women of the tiny town of Fetter-Rothnie have grown used to a life without men, and none more so than the tangle of mothers and daughters, spinsters and widows living at the Weatherhouse. Returned from war with shellshock, Garry Forbes is drawn into their circle as he struggles to build a new understanding of the world from the ruins of his grief. In The Weatherhouse Nan Shepherd paints an exquisite portrait of a community coming to terms with the brutal losses of war, and the small tragedies, yearnings and delusions that make up a life.

Too often seen as a ghost from the past, nationalism has resurfaced as a major factor in European politics and culture. A powerful commitment to national autonomy has marked Scottish writing throughout the twentieth century. How has the emergence of new voices from feminist, gay and lesbian critics transformed that commitment? How critical and pluralistic can the new nationalisms be? This collection serves notice that the tradition is being read in new and disruptive ways. Five women and four men examine the relationship between gender and nationality, how male and female authors portray women, the treatment of sexuality in Scottish writing, the construction of Scottish masculinity and its relation to class and homophobia. Covering modern fiction and theatre, poetry, film and television, it is a provocative reassessment of the gender and culture of a 'stateless nation'.

This collection explores how nineteenth and twentieth-century women writers incorporated the idea of ‘place’ into their writing. Whether writing from a specific location or focusing upon a particular geographical or imaginary place, women writers working between 1850 and 1950 valued ‘a space of their own’ in which to work. The period on which this collection focuses straddles two main areas of study, nineteenth century writing and early twentieth century/modernist writing, so it enables discussion of how ideas of space progressed alongside changes in styles of writing. It looks to the many ways women writers explored concepts of space and place and how they expressed these through their writings, for example how they interpreted both urban and rural landscapes and how they presented domestic spaces. A Space of Their Own will be of interest to those studying Victorian literature and modernist works as it covers a period of immense change for women’s rights in society. It is also not limited to just one type or definition of ‘space’. Therefore, it may also be of interest to academics outside of literature – for example, in gender studies, cultural geography, place writing and digital humanities.

This volume considers the major themes, texts and authors of Scottish literature of the twentieth and, so far, twenty-first century. It identifies the contexts and impulses that led Scottish writers to adopt their creative literary strategies. Moving beyond traditional classifications, it draws on the most recent critical approaches to open up new perspectives on Scottish literature since 1900. The volume's innovative thematic structure ensures that the most important texts or authors are seen from different perspectives whether in the context of empire, renaissance, war and post-war, literary genre, generation, and resistance. In order to provide thorough coverage, these thematic chapters are complemented by chronological 'Arcade' chapters, which outline the contexts of the literature of the period by decades, and by 'Overview' chapters which trace developments across the century in theatre, language and Gaelic literature. Taken together, the chapters provide a thorough and thought-provoking account of the century's literature.

This is the first comprehensive critical analysis of Scottish women's writing from its recoverable beginnings to the present day. Essays cover individual writers - such as Margaret Oliphant, Nan Shepherd, Muriel Spark and Liz Lochhead - as well as groups of writers or kinds of writing - such as women poets and dramatists, or Gaelic writing and the legacy of the Kailyard. In addition to poetry, drama and fiction, a varied body of non-fiction writing is also covered, including diaries, memoirs, biography and autobiography, didactic and polemic writing, and popular and periodical writing for and by women.

Edited and introductions by Roderick Watson. The Quarry Wood, although published well before Sunset Song, inhabits a similar world; the progress of its heroine could almost be the alternative story of a Chris Guthrie who did go to university. Compassionate and humorous, the grace and style of Shepherd’s prose is heightened by a superb ear for the vigorous language of the north-east. The Weatherhouse, Shepherd’s masterpiece, is an even more substantial achievement which belongs to the great line of Scottish fiction dealing with the complex interactions of small communities, and especially the community of women – a touching and hilarious network of mothers, daughters, spinsters and widows. It is also a striking meditation on the nature of truth, the power of human longing and the mystery of being. The third and final novel, A Pass in the Grampians, describes Jenny Kilgour’s coming of age as she has to choose between the kindly harshness of her grandfather’s life on a remote hill farm, and the vulgar and glorious energy of Bella Cassie, a local girl who left the community to pursue success as a singer, and has now returned to scandalise them all. The Living Mountain is a lyrical testament in praise of the Cairngorms. It is a work deeply rooted in Shepherd’s knowledge of the natural world, and a poetic and philosophical meditation on our longing for high and holy places. This is the first omnibus edition of Shepherd’s prose works – her sensitivity and powers of observation raise her work far above the status of regional literature and into the front rank of Scottish writing.

When three strangers arrive on Block Island, RI just months before the US enters WW1, suspicion fills the air. A close-knit family working together at the United States Weather Station doesn't trust these strangers -- for what turns out to be a very good reason. Even before the first murder occurs, the Weather House crew realizes they need back-up, but who can they trust? It becomes their burden to unlock these strangers' true objectives, which, if carried out, will decidedly change the course of our nation's history. With the family's two sisters at the center of the action, The Weather House -- equal parts international espionage, mystery, and history -- explores relationships and communication, motives, hidden agendas and loss, and the purpose of being. The greatest triumph of the author, beyond the story, is the creation of such memorable characters and the reader finds him/herself cheering the girls on as they help uncover why three strange men have suddenly appeared on their island. One of the sisters has had to overcome a significant physical disability as the result of an unfortunate accident. The author, a physician, has worked within the disabilities world and portrays the struggles and triumphs of these girls with aplomb. Set at a time when death and destruction are synonymous with an isolated island life, Block Island and its inhabitants become a metaphor for life in this classic American tale where the line blurs between villain and hero. Gary E. Eddey's debut novel shows that even a small island can hold a very big secret.

"When Lillian Beckwith advertised for a secluded place in the country, she received a letter with the following unusual description of an isolated Hebridean croft: 'Surely it's that quiet even the sheeps themselves on the hills is lonely and as to the sea it's that near as I use it myself everyday for the refusals...' Her curiosity aroused, Beckwith took up the invitation. This is the comic and enchanting story of the strange rest cure that followed and her efforts to adapt to a completely different way of life."--Back cover.