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The distinguished Scottish
poet and literary critic who writes this book recalls how Bernard Shaw
in On The Rocks ironically declares that the massacres after the Battle
of Culloden were not "murder" but simply "liquidation," since the slain
Scots in question were "incompatible with British civilization." He then
surveys the whole field of Scottish biography, and shows how true this
has proved of an amazing number of distinguished Scots, no matter how
successfully the bulk of the Scottish people have been assimilated to
English standards since the Union. The facts are irresistible and bring
out the "eccentricity" of Scottish genius in an extraordinary fashion.
The author gives full-length studies often outstanding Scottish
eccentrics, including Lord George Gordon of the "Gordon Riots"; Sir
Thomas Urquhart, the translator of 'Rabelais', "Christopher North";
"Ossian" (James Macpherson, M.P.); James Hogg, the Ettrick Shepherd; and
William McGonagall, perhaps the world's best "bad poet". But he supports
these leading cases with apt material drawn from the lives of hundreds
of Scots of every period in history and every walk of life, and in this
way builds up a brilliant panoramic picture of Scottish psychology
through the ages, singularly at variance with all generally accepted
views of the national character.
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