List three books that have had an impact on you. Why?
Today’s topic is books on Scottish history. In order to make my walking tours of Edinburgh as memorable and incredible as possible, I read a decent amount. In the past I might’ve said a lot but I have come to know people in my life who devour multiple books a week and my process is a bit slower. Sometimes I take books and meditate on them seriously over the course of weeks or months. Often I return to them for reference. I am also an avid re-reader, as it can be easy to miss key details the first time round. I’ve selected these three books to answer today’s prompt because I consider them fundamentally good books, and also amongst the most enjoyable for books on Scottish history. I’ve mostly chosen them for their incredible fun facts of Scottish history.
There are many others as I’ve read at least 20 books that are devoted to the topic of Scotland and Edinburgh as part of my research. These are ones of greater interest to the general reader. Though they are of course no substitute for coming on a walking tour.
Let’s explore together.
The Scottish history books
The three Scottish history books I have chosen have a few advantages. I will go into detail in the next section, because I’ve got some great information on the writers, too. Essentially, Rosalind K. Marshall’s book specialises on women in Scottish history. Ian Crofton’s ‘Scottish History Without the Boring Bits’ is meanwhile one of these books that you don’t have to read linearly, you can jump into any page and it’ll detail the truly fascinating events of Scottish history year by year. Fitzroy Maclean’s ‘Scotland’ meanwhile is the most general and concise history of Scotland that it is probably possible to give.
I will deal with them in reverse order.
‘Scotland’ by Fitzroy Maclean
This book covers Scotland from the “mists of antiquity” all the way up to the Scottish independence referendum of 2014. It would be fair to say this is a colossal length of time to cover in a mere 159 pages. With at least 2014 years covered, this means it’s roughly 12 and 2/3 years per page!
Which is not a measure I think generally used to talk about history books of Scotland, but I think it’s very fitting, actually.
Fitzroy Maclean, the writer
There is at least one clear bias worth discussing and it is the fact that Fitzroy Maclean was a Unionist politician, what the Scottish Conservatives used to call themselves. So Maclean is essentially placing Scotland into the context of being in a Union with England to make Britain and that essentially being a good thing. This is a matter which would get you quite an interesting discussion in Scotland.
Still, in spite of this clear bias that I do not agree with, Maclean cannot be faulted for his research or his no-nonsense writing style. He is never boring.
It’s also fascinating that Maclean was alleged to be one of the inspirations for James Bond. This was never confirmed by anyone though and he is not considered leading candidate right now.
‘Scottish History Without the Boring Bits’ by Ian Crofton
This is one of my favourite sorts of book. It is wall to wall with fun facts, crazy little stories, and it makes the country feel so alive in every single year. For example, here’s one selected from a random page.
1713: JACOBITES IN DRAG – PART 1: Lady Euphemia, wife of the Jacobite spy Sir George Lockhart of Lee, used to visit Edinburgh dressed in male attire in order to pick up intelligence from the Whig coffee houses. On one occasion she learnt that an ardent Whig called Forbes had obtained some papers compromising her husband, and he intended to forward these papers to the government. Daniel Wilson in his ‘Reminiscences of Old Edinburgh’, describes what happened next: “According to the narrative communicated to me by her nephew, Lady Euphemia Lockhart dressed her sons – two fair and somewhat effeminate-looking, though handsome youths – in negligee, fardingale, and masks, with patches, jewels, and all the finery of accomplished courtesans. Thus equipped, they sallied out to the Cross, and watching for the Whig gallant, they soon won his favour, and inducing him to accompany them to a neighbouring tavern… [where] the pseudo fair ones fairly drank him below the table, and the rifled his pockets of the dangerous papers.
This is the sort of history that really gets people involved in what’s gone on in this city over the years. It has political intrigue, two examples of crossdressing, and it gives you an idea of the feel of Edinburgh in the early 18th-century. It tells you about the high stakes political games being played. It’s also good because it shows you a women in history who was active and had agency in a way which many history books often forget, Scottish and international.
This book ranges from 3948BC, said to be the creation of Adam, all the way to 2015, in 223 pages. so 26 and 7/10 years per page! What a vast collection of fun facts.
Ian Crofton, the writer
Looking up Crofton, he’s a writer of a lot of fun facts as well as some personal adventures of his own. Over 41 books according to Good Reads. It’s the career of someone who has been able to follow his personal interests while also writing commercially viable and entertaining work.
He describes ‘Scottish History Without the Boring Bits’ well in his intro.
It may be that the present selection says more about the author than anything else. I have a tendency to suspect all those in authority of being rogues and hypocrites, an associated penchant for pricking pomposity. I celebrate the bawdy, the subversive, the eccentric and the different, the put-upon and the misunderstood. I know I am not the only Scot to hold such attitudes, attitudes that run like a strong pulsing vein through our history and culture. A hefty dose of snook-cocking lends vigour to our body politic, which might otherwise putrefy into a carcass reeking of piety, power, lust, slack-jawed credulity and tut-tutting self-righteousness.
Basically, he’s the sort of writer a lot of us would dream of being.
‘Of Virgins and Viragos’ by Rosalind K. Marshall
It’s amazing what you can find in the right second-hand bookshop, I believe I found this in Till’s Bookshop.
This is an ambitious historical book of covering 1000 years of Scottish women’s history. Then again, at 315 pages this makes for a leisurely 3 and 17/100 years per page.
It tells the story of women as active participants in Scottish history, even though they were often anonymised and forgotten. (Which would be a great title for a tour we recently announced). It covers ladies who held castles against the English, medical innovators, but also wives and mothers. There’s a lot of interesting fun facts about Scottish history in there, with a lot of proper context. For example, there’s a section where Marshall talks about women who were going for intellectual pursuits in the later 18th-century and faced jeering from many men and spitefulness from many women, so had to negotiate a complicated world to achieve success.
It’s eye-opening to see what the past was like.
Rosalind K. Marshall, the writer
Ever since reading this book, I’ve had a bit of an academic love for Marshall. She’s done a fair few amazing books covering key figures in Scottish history. One I’ve read in full, for literally a three-sentence stop on my tour, was her biography of John Knox. She puts his life in perspective including his famous misogyny, which was primarily about power and religion.
She’s a Fellow of Royal Society of Literature and just generally I find her work very well worth time. One of these days once I find time I plan on reading more of hers because I think she reveals a lot of interesting stories about Scottish history which are so often misunderstood, or simplified for public edification.
There is space for simplicity, but every now and then it is more important for someone to add complexity to a subject.
The writer of this piece wonders if anyone got his very dry joke.
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