Literary Scotland

The Clyde Valley and Glasgow10tension between working-class and middleclassexperience and expectations, betweenpeople who live in slums and those who livein more prosperous areas, and the furtheropposition between city-dwellers and theexperience of life in the country. South of theriver, the Gorbals was the scene of perhapsthe most famous of all literary depictionsof Glasgow, Alexander McArthur andH. Kingsley Long’s sensational novel NoMean City (1935). The tenement slums havebeen demolished. Near where they were isthe Citizens’ Theatre, founded by playwrightJames Bridie in 1943. The Gorbals was alsothe home of the fine writer of stories andthe novel Dance of the Apprentices (1948),Edward Gaitens. Edwin Muir’s novel PoorTom (1932) is an autobiographical account ofpoverty-stricken life in the city. Returning tothe city centre, George Square is populated bystatues of Walter Scott, Robert Burns andThomas Campbell, who was a Glasgow poetand famous for many generations, writingcritically of the industrial revolution and thepollution that came with it: ‘And call they thisimprovement?’ Numerous writers studiedat Glasgow School of Art, including JohnByrne, Alasdair Gray, Stephen Mulrineand Liz Lochhead. Near Charing Crossstands the Mitchell Library, the largest publicreference library in Europe. Travelling westalong Woodlands Road towards GlasgowUniversity, on the south side of WoodlandsRoad is the statue of Lobey Dosser, Sheriffof Calton Creek, taking his enemy the archvillainRank Bajin off to jail, on the backof his trusty two-legged horse El Fideldo.This is the only two-legged equestrian statuein the world, erected by public subscription,suggesting the affection in which Glasgowpeople continue to hold the creator ofthese characters, the genius cartoonist BudNeill. The many writers, either students orteachers or both, associated with GlasgowUniversity, include Robert Henryson,Alasdair MacMhaighstir Alistair, AdamSmith, James Boswell, Tobias Smollett,John Buchan, A.J. Cronin, James Bridie,Catherine Carswell, Janice Galloway,Christopher Brookmyre, Edwin Morgan,Alexander Scott, Alexander Trocchi, TomLeonard, Liz Lochhead, Alasdair Gray,James Kelman and Louise Welsh.48 renton and ballochNow travelling north and west, CameronHouse Hotel, Balloch was formerly thehome of novelist and poet Tobias Smollettand the Smollett Monument is a TuscanColumn in Renton, near Balloch. In Ballochitself, the Loch Lomond and the TrossachsNational Park Centre, Carrochan, activelypromotes literary tourism throughout LochLomondside and the Trossachs.Above Main entrance to the Glasgow School of Art.33