East Neuk

It has been a hectic week, starting with a day trip to York to run a workshop for the university, no mean feat from Highland Perthshire where I live, and culminating in a phone call from my 23-year-old son Jake, … Continue reading

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Sticky labels

How diminished we are by the labels that people attach to us or we attach to ourselves. And how forcefully that has been brought home to me during the referendum campaign. Nationalist, Unionist. Yes, No. Scottish, English. None of us … Continue reading

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96 days

Sometimes an idea grips you in the guts and won’t let go. No amount of reasoning will dislodge it and in time one comes to accept it as a personal truth. So it is for me with Scottish independence. Wherever … Continue reading

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True grit

As someone generally preoccupied with stories, I’m particularly interested when a single story is open to diametrically opposing interpretations. Once one starts to think about it, it’s surprising how many of these we carry around with us. Looking for an … Continue reading

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Ubi caritas

These last ten days or so have been spectacular. There’s a generosity in the air, a sense of abundance. All around us the woods are carpeted with bluebells. Sprays of hawthorn blossom decorate hedges and roadsides. The trees are bursting … Continue reading

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Lone Rangers

I’m about to drive into Edinburgh to record a four-way interview about the Dark Angels collective novel Keeping Mum for the BBC World Service. It’s Thursday evening and today is publication day. According to the information sheet from the friendly … Continue reading

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Making mischief

Most people who provide some kind of creative service to the business world long for a client who will say yes to their more extravagant ideas. But such clients are extremely thin on the ground. General anxiety, paucity of imagination … Continue reading

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The Angels’ Share

Has there ever before been a fifteen-author book signing? Unbound, publishers of the Dark Angels collective novel Keeping Mum, have just posted photographs of this unusual, probably unique event on Facebook. It preceded our 10th anniversary dinner last week at … Continue reading

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A place at table

Commensality. I first came across the word a few years ago when I wrote an appeal for a community of monks. It means the act of sitting at table together (remember that famous first declension Latin noun, mensa?). Commensality was … Continue reading

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Things that make me cry

‘Are you turning into a marshmallow?’ asked Sarah the other night. The answer is probably Yes. I seem to cry more easily as I get older. What’s curious though is what makes me cry. It’s not so much the things … Continue reading

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