National identities are constructed around a nation’s history as well as the territory it occupies. Scotland, which has been a stateless nation since the Union of Parliaments in 1707, had no state institutions to disseminate this identity. So in their absence, literature stepped into the breach and kept Scotland’s separate identity alive. Scottish literature, therefore, ideally lends itself to tracing the changes to Scottish identity over the course of time.
This book analyses and compares two panoramic Scottish texts, Lewis Grassic Gibbon’s A Scots Quair (1932-1934) and James Robertson’s And the Land Lay Still (2010) in order to map the developments Scottish identity underwent during the 20th century, in which Scotland’s place within the United Kingdom was radically re-thought, leading to devolution and the re-opening of the Scottish Parliament in 1999 and finally culminating in a robust movement for Scottish independence, which survived defeat in the 2014 Independence Referendum and still shapes public discourse as well as government policy in Scotland today.


TABLE OF CONTENTS

Acknowledgements v


1 Introduction 1


2 Identity and the Nation 5
2.1 Defining ‘Nation’, ‘National Identity’ and ‘Nationalism’ 5
2.2 History and National Identity 14
2.3 The Land and National Identity 21
2.4 Literature and National Identity 28
2.5 Narratives of the Nation 34


3 Lewis Grassic Gibbon, A Scots Quair 37
3.1 Context 38
3.2 History 46
3.2.1 Narrative Structure 47
3.2.2 Scottish and British / World History in A Scots Quair 53
3.2.3 Case-Study 1: The Covenanters 58
3.2.4 Case-Study 2: The Great War 69
3.2.5 Case-Study 3: The 1926 General Strike 84
3.2.6 Case-Study 4: The Hunger Marches of the 1930s 90
3.2.7 The Presentation of History in A Scots Quair 96
3.3 The Land 97
3.3.1 Conception of the Land 98
3.3.2 Representations of Life in Rural Scotland 104
3.3.3 Representations of Life in Urban Scotland 121
3.4 Conclusion 131


4 James Robertson, And the Land Lay Still 133
4.1 Context 135
4.2 History 144
4.2.1 Narrative Structure 145
4.2.2 Scottish vs. British History in And the Land Lay Still 158
4.2.3 Case-Study 1: World War II 159
4.2.4 Case-Study 2: The Stone of Destiny 173
4.2.5 Case-Study 3: The Miners’ Strike of 1984/85 180
4.2.6 Case-Study 4: The Poll Tax 188
4.2.7 The Presentation of History in And the Land Lay Still 196
4.3 The Land 198
4.3.1 Conception of the Land 198
4.3.2 Representations of Life in Rural Scotland 207
4.3.3 Representations of Life in Urban Scotland 219
4.4 Conclusion 233


5 Comparison 237
5.1 Context 237
5.2 History 241
5.3 The Land 247


6 Conclusion 253


Works Cited 257
Primary Sources 257
Secondary Sources 257


Appendices 265
Appendix A: Timeline of Historical Events Included in Lewis Grassic Gibbon’s A Scots Quair 265
Appendix B: Timeline of Historical Events Included in James Robertson’s And the Land Lay Still 282