Butcher's Broom (Ebook)
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An epic historical novel set in the Scottish Highlands which depicts the decline of rural culture, by one of the leading lights of the Scottish renaissance of the 1920s and 1930s.
Butcher's Broom is one of Gunn's epic recreations of a key period in Scottish history, the Highland clearances of the nineteenth century. Gunn captures the spirit of Highland culture, the sense of community and tradition, in a manner that speaks to our own time.
At the centre of the novel is Dark Mairi who embodies what is most vital and lasting in mankind, whose values encapsulate what was lost in Scotland to make way for progress while her land was cleared to make way for wintering sheep.
The weaving of traditional ballads with the lives of Gunn's characters evokes the community that must be destroyed. Elie lost among strangers with her fatherless child while Seonaid defies the invaders, fighting them from the roof of her croft.
This is among the most moving of Gunn's works and establishes the belief in a transcendent spirituality that would be so dominant in his later work.
Reviews for Butcher's Broom
Neil MacDiarmid
Glasgow Evening Times
Scotsman
Times Literary Supplement
Neil M. Gunn
Neil M. Gunn was a Scottish novelist, critic and dramatist. Born in the northernmost county of mainland Scotland in 1891, he began his career as a customs and excise officer and spent sixteen years working at the Glen Mhor Whisky Distillery. He wrote prolifically throughout his life, authoring over twenty novels, essays and works of non-fiction. In 1937 he won the James Tait Black Memorial Prize for his novel Highland River. Gunn is regarded as one of the most important Scottish authors of the early twentieth century and a leading light of the 'Scottish Renaissance' of the 1920s and 30s. He died in 1973.
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