The proposer provided a detailed background to the author’s
life, his relationships with his family and with the countryside in which he
grew up. Born James Leslie Mitchell on 13th February 1901. He was raised in
farming communities in the Howe of Mearns. The family scraped a living from the
land with great difficulty and as a child he was expected to help with the
endless chores. His father was strict and life was harsh. Mitchell was
intelligent and thoughtful forming his own views of life, challenging traditional
values and this set him apart from his family and the community of the Mearns.
He gained a place at Stonehaven’s Mackie Academy but at the
age of 16 walked out following an argument with a teacher. He worked as a
trainee journalist in Aberdeen between 1917-1919 and joined the ‘Scottish
Farmer” in Glasgow. There followed a troubled period in his life. He was
dismissed over expenses irregularities and attempted to take his own life. His
family took him back in the hope that he would settle to the farming life but
he could not and in order to escape the Mearns he joined the army. Although he
hated life in the army, it did allow him to travel. In particular to the Middle
East and Egypt, which inspired his first short stories and much of his fiction
and non-fiction.
Mitchell returned to the Mearns in 1925 to marry a local
girl whom he had kept in touch with throughout his years of travel. They moved
to London where life was initially difficult, however, he eventually
established himself as a talented writer.
From 1930 to 1934, eleven novels, two books of short stories, three
anthropological books and an “ intelligent Man’s Guide to Albyn” with Hugh
MacDiarmid entitled “Scottish Scene” were published under the names Mitchell
and Gibbon. He died prematurely in 1935 of peritonitis brought on by a
perforated ulcer.
The most important of his output is the trilogy of novels,
“A Scots Quair“ published under the name Lewis Grassic Gibbon (taken from his
mother’s maiden name). The “Quair” (meaning book) is a trilogy, which was
published over three years as “Sunset Song” (1932), “Cloud Howe” (1933), and
“Grey Granite” (1934). Sunset Song is considered to be Gibbon’s most loved work
and, out of the three “Quair” novels, the most easily read as a single book.
Most members of the book group first encountered Sunset Song
as a “must” read on the Scottish Higher English Syllabus. Many had moved on
from the “forced reading” and revisited the novel to enjoy and more fully
appreciate the qualities that have made it one of the most important Scottish
novels of the twentieth century. In addition to reading the book many had seen
the BBC’s 1971 serialization and some had seen Terence Davies’s film released
in 2015.
The story, woven round the character of Chris Guthrie, draws
on Gibbons own experiences of living and working in the Mearns. It was
suggested that it is this that provides the fascinating and sometimes intimate
insight into a way of life that was changing rapidly through the impact of
mechanization on farming communities and the devastating effect of the war. The
book ends with the end of the First World War and this heralds the end of the
crofting way of life. Chris is intelligent, capable and spirited but also
conflicted by what she describes as her Scottish self and her English self. Her
love of the land and the rural way of life and her need to satisfy her interest
in literature and more scholarly pursuits.
The novel details the challenges she faces through girlhood
to being a young widow with a child. Her life is harsh and at times brutal
living in a dysfunctional family, observing its disintegration and coping with
the associated tragedy and loss. While Chris is the central character some of
the charm of the book comes from the vivid depiction of other characters, their
behavior, moods and physical attributes. It was pointed out that Kinraddie
itself is a collection of farms- Blawearie, Peesie’s Knapp, Cuddiestoun,
Netherhill, The Mains, Bridge End etc populated by characters that anyone from
those parts can recognize. Long Rob of the Mill. Pooty the shoemaker, Chae
Strachan, Mr Gibbon, Mistress Munro. The language, wit, and humour of these
characterizations add hugely to the depiction of community life.
The accuracy of these descriptions and the frankness of their
portrayal proved to be controversial and provoked his mother to comment that he
had made the family “the speak of the Mearns”. The way that Gibbons used the
custom of gossiping to depict life in Kinraddie provided both insight and
amusement in equal measure and was greatly appreciated by all.
“ Aye, if it is wan’t in a rage it was fair in a stir of a
scandal by postman time”
It was mentioned that at some point there is a telling
passage about gossip replacing meaningful activity and it was suggested that
gossip, not necessarily deliberately malicious, more a kind of recreational
activity is a continual theme ripe with scandal and innuendo but funny too.
“Alec would say Damn it, you’ve hardly to look at a woman
these days but she’s in the family way”
The deft admixture of gossip, spite, cruelty and blinkered
prejudice that inhabited Kinraddie provided a rich source of material. The
language is unique to Gibbons and initially presented a challenge to some of
our group, however, all agreed that they quickly got hold of it and then began
to appreciate the importance of rhythms designed to capture the local pattern
of speech and the lyrical descriptive capacity which brought the landscape to
life.
“ This is one of the best books I have read, describing the land,
the moors, hills and stones and the essence of cultivation of the land.”
“ The vocabulary was a delight, full of colourful imagery
and dialect that conjured up the world of the Mearns folk.”
All agreed with the views of one commentator that “The book’s
personality is shaped by that language.” Lyrical passages are precise,
evocative but also linked to the harsh reality of farm work.
“There were larks coming over that morning, Chris minded,
whistling and trilling dark and unseen against the blazing of the sun, now one
lark now another, till the sweetness of the trilling dizzied you and you
stumbled with the heavy pails of corn-laden” the sentence ends, “and father
swore at you over the red beard of him Damn’t to hell, are you fair a fool, you
quean?”
Descriptive passages display a deep and sensitive
appreciation of the landscape and the workings of the elements on it.
“the June moors whispered and rustled and shook their
cloaks, yellow with broom and powdered faintly with purple- that was the
heather but not the full passion of its colour yet…and maybe the wind would
veer there in an hour or so and you’d feel the change in the life and strum of
the thing, bringing a streaming coolness out of the sea”
There followed a discussion about the possibility that those
book club members who were familiar with the landscape and were acquainted with
aspects of the language would be more able to appreciate the quality of
Gibbon’s writing. It was concluded that, while it might be easier for some to
understand the nostalgic theme comprehension did not require knowledge of the
precise meanings of the language used.
The simple structure of the novel was considered by the
group and the majority thought that it assisted the reader and added an
emphasis to Chris’s love /hate relationship with Kinraddie. The novel has a
prelude “The Unfurrowed Field” which outlines the history of and introduces the
characters inhabiting the Kinraddie estate, followed by four main sections,
titled respectively Ploughing, Drilling, Seed-Time and Harvest. Each section
begins with Chris at an important time in her life, seated at the standing
stones reflecting on what has happened in the past, returning to the present
time at the end of the section. There were some who felt that this approach
resulted in slowing the tempo and detracted from their enjoyment of the novel.
It was concluded that this novel fully deserved to have been
voted Scotland’s best novel in 2005. It was described as a work of substance,
with Gibbons displaying considerable courage by controversially addressing
taboo subjects in a very direct way.
All of those who had yet to read “Cloud Howe” and/or “Grey
Granite” committed to doing so in order to more fully appreciate the scope of
Gibbons ambition in writing “A Scots Quair.”
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