Gordon Williams 1934-2017. Novelist from Paisley who almost won the Booker Prize

George Gissing’s 1891 novel “New Grub Street” about literary and journalistic London has as its main characters two aspiring writers. Jasper Milvain who puts commercial success ahead of art and secures the editorship of an important periodical and Edwin Reardon who although a talented novelist can’t support his family, his wife leaves him and he […]

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Out in Scotland! LGBT display

(Sandstone Press) February is  LGBT History Month and we are celebrating the LGBT Scottish writing perspective with a small display just outside the Reading Rooms in our George IV Bridge building in Edinburgh. LGBT writing is especially vibrant in Scotland at the moment with many top sellers and prize winners. Recent National Library guest Val […]

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Stevenson on screen

This week we are celebrating Robert Louis Stevenson’s contribution to cinema with a display highlighting film versions of his most famous novels. Although he died in 1894, a couple of years before the birth of cinema, RLS made an impact on films all the same. He is one of the most adapted writers for the […]

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The world of Agatha Christie

In 1921, a publishing phenomenon began with the publication of The Mysterious Affair at Styles, a sophisticated murder mystery with a protagonist by the name of Hercule Poirot. It was the first of more than 60 crime novels by Agatha Christie, and heralded the career of an author who has been unsurpassed by any crime […]

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J.R.R Tolkien: the making of a legend

(Photo credit: Lion Hudson) (Above image shows a photograph of J.R.R. Tolkien) Long before the massively successful The Lord of the Rings films, J.R.R Tolkien’s creations and characters had captured the imagination of millions of readers. Today, it is difficult to imagine a world without Tolkien’s stories of Middle-earth, elves, wizards and hobbits. But who […]

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