by Morelle Smith It’s the 30th Marché de la Poésie and it takes place in the tree shaded square by the newly renovated church of Saint Sulpice, Paris. There are hundreds of publishing houses represented here, some well known, some small, all selling volumes of poetry – though there are also a few works of […]

Carl von Linné – or Linnaeus as the world outside Sweden remembers him – was what we would now call a “control-freak”. And like all control-freaks, he was often frustrated by the unwillingness of people, animals and the natural world in general to do as they were told. Even as a boy, he would order […]

  Scottish PEN members might like to check out the recent New Island Books release, Banished Babies The Secret Story of Ireland’s Baby Export Business –Updated and Expanded Edition This is the updated version of RTE investigative journalist Mike Milotte’s book, first published in the 1990s, about overseas adoptions of Irish babies born in Irish […]

‘As part of the Royal Shakespeare Company’s ‘OPEN STAGES’ project, John Coutts has written ‘ SHAKESPEARE IN STIRLING’; in which the great poet and dramatist makes an undercover visit to Scotland as an English government agent. He visits the royal court in Castle, where King James VI is scheming to inherit the English throne. Subtitled ‘an unhistorical fantasy’, […]

In February or March this year, International PEN asked members for a few lines on a piece of writing by a woman writer we particularly admired, to mark International Women’s Day on March 8th. You can find the contributions sent in  on their website here  Some of the books I’ve already read, but others I have […]

  Once upon a time there were two authors called Harriet. Superficially they had much in common. Both American, they were born and died within a couple of years of each other. Both were dedicated to ending slavery. However, there the similarities end. Harriet Beecher Stowe   Harriet Beecher Stowe grew up in a family […]

  I felt very honoured to be invited to become the next Honorary President of Scottish Pen and was delighted to accept. I published my first adult novel, Liam’s Daughter, set in Ireland and France,in 1963. When my second one, The Prevailing Wind, firmly placed in the Marchmont district of Edinburgh, came out the following year the publisher, […]

  WHAT PRICE THE NOBEL PEACE PRIZE by Jean Rafferty, WIPC   The Nobel Peace Prize is generally accepted as one of the highest honours a human being can win, a recognition of exceptional courage or integrity, affirmation that you have lived your life honourably and decently. But sometimes it’s even more than that. It’s […]