When you ask yourself why a writer might choose to use a pen name, what springs to mind? Perhaps you think of the famous female writers of the nineteenth century, like the Brontë sisters, for whom publishing under their real names would have risked not being published at all. Or you think of it as […]
“Mark” a short story by Saki
Our blog generally features short pieces on the Library’s collections and associated activities but as it is the holiday season we thought we would post a very short story. The story and its author are featured in our current exhibition “Pen names” which explores authors who publish books under assumed names. The author of the […]
The many names of Laurence James
The National Library of Scotland is a Legal Deposit library, which means we build our collections by requesting a copy of every book published in the UK and Ireland. Thanks to Legal Deposit the Library is home to probably the largest collection of popular fiction in Scotland. If you are interested in crime, romance, westerns, […]
“Christine Strathern imbues this romantic story with all her own abiding love for her native Scotland”
The Scottish author Nancy Brysson Morrison (1903-1986) is chiefly remembered today for her novel ‘The Gowk Storm’ a story about three daughters of a Scottish church minister. First published in 1933, the book was reissued as part of the Canongate Classics series in 1988. Morrison’s first two books were published by John Murray and the […]
Ian Rankin and the Missing Person Case of Jack Harvey
In 1993, the novel ‘Witch Hunt’ appeared in bookshops. But who was the author, Jack Harvey, seemingly a first-time novelist? Given his now familiar status as the biggest-selling contemporary writer of crime fiction in the UK it is hardly a secret. But at the time this was not an easy mystery to solve. Harvey was […]
100th Anniversary of One of the Greatest Poems of the 20th Century
October 2022 marks the centenary of the publication of T. S. Eliot’s The Waste Land. Arguably the most influential poem written in English in the 20th century, it marked a turning point in modernist literature. Although the poem’s origins arose in the desolation of post-World War I Europe, its myriad themes still resonate today through their […]
What about the Workers? Labour History Archive Collections at the Library
If you request an item from the Library’s archive and manuscript collections or stream a film through our website, chances are you’ll come into contact with the history of Scottish working people. Whether it’s the crafting of materials for medieval manuscript illuminations, ledgers documenting the work of crofters, plans used by the builders of Scotland’s […]
“Out of obscurity I came – to obscurity I can easily return”: Charlotte Brontë, Currer Bell and Jane Eyre
The use of pseudonyms by the Brontë sisters is perhaps one of the best known examples of the use of pen names in English literature. This post focusses on Charlotte Brontë (1816-1855), whose novel ‘Jane Eyre’ was published 175 years ago in October 1847. It was Charlotte who persuaded her sisters to submit their writing […]
The life and poetry of Phillis Wheatley Peters
As part of Black History Month the Library has a display in the Special Collections Reading Room (SCRR) celebrating the work of Phillis Wheatley Peters. Peters was a talented poet and believed to be the first Black American to publish a book of poetry. This blog will look at her life and poetry. Born possibly […]
James Dover Grant becomes bestselling author Lee Child
Lee Child is the author of a series of thrillers about former American military police officer Jack Reacher. who travels around the United States by bus carrying only a toothbrush and a bank card. It has been claimed that a Jack Reacher novel is sold every four seconds, fans of the series include Stephen King, […]