Festival Book Club

The club is usually bi-monthly, with members meeting in Wigtown and participating online.  

Andrew Wilson, a book Club member hopes these notes about Sunset Song get you thinking!

The book was written before the Great War when society, farming, even the landscape of Scotland was very different. Do you think it is still relevant to read a book about life in the rural North East?

Personally I love the way the author writes, because although not using broad Scots, it catches the rhythm and style that country folk use, but did you find that style difficult?

Do you recognise the characters in the book? Could someone have written a book like this about rural SW Scotland?

Chrisie Guthrie is the main character, but the author is male. How do you feel about a man writing from a woman's perspective? Does he write well?

The author describes some 'taboo' subjects: incest, suicide, cruelty, the effect of war, broken relationships (marriage, father/son, and a bit of promiscuity). What do you think about that?

He also describes the crippling inability to talk about feelings; totally different is the modest simplicity of a Scottish country wedding in the front room of the house. Are these particularly Scottish things, or are they universal? Can you find other examples of uniquely Scottish personality traits, or is there no such thing?