Everand Logo

Welcome to Everand!

  • Discover millions of ebooks, audiobooks, and so much more with a free trial

    Only $11.99/month after trial. Cancel anytime.

    Unavailable
    Love of Country: A Journey through the Hebrides
    Unavailable
    Love of Country: A Journey through the Hebrides
    Unavailable
    Love of Country: A Journey through the Hebrides
    Ebook396 pages11 hours

    Love of Country: A Journey through the Hebrides

    By Madeleine Bunting

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    Few landscapes are as striking as that of the Hebrides, the hundreds of small islands that speckle the waters off Scotland’s northwest coast. The jagged, rocky cliffs and roiling waves serve as a reminder of the islands’ dramatic geological history, inspiring awe and dread in those drawn there. With Britain at their back and facing the Atlantic, the Hebrides were at the center of ancient shipping routes and have a remarkable cultural history as well, as a meeting place for countless cultures that interacted with a long, rich Gaelic tradition.

    After years of hearing about Scotland as a place deeply interwoven with the story of her family, Madeleine Bunting was driven to see for herself this place so symbolic and full of history. Most people travel in search of the unfamiliar, to leave behind the comfort of what’s known to explore some suitably far-flung corner of the globe. From the first pages, it’s clear that Madeleine Bunting’s Love of Country marks a different kind of journey—one where all paths lead to a closer understanding of home, but a home bigger than Bunting’s corner of Britain, the drizzly, busy streets of London with their scream of sirens and high-rise developments crowding the sky. Over six years, Bunting returned again and again to the Hebrides, fascinated by the question of what it means to belong there, a question that on these islands has been fraught with tenacious resistance and sometimes tragedy. With great sensitivity, she takes readers through the Hebrides’ history of dispossession and displacement, a history that can be understand only in the context of Britain’s imperial past, and she shows how the Hebrides have been repeatedly used to define and imagine Britain. In recent years, the relationship between Britain and Scotland has been subject to its most testing scrutiny, and Bunting’s travels became a way to reflect on what might be lost and what new possibilities might lie ahead.

    For all who have wondered how it might feel to stand face-out at the edge of home, Love of Country is a revelatory journey through one of the world’s most remote, beautiful landscapes that encourages us to think of the many identities we wear as we walk our paths, and how it is possible to belong to many places while at the same time not wholly belonging to any.
     
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherUniversity of Chicago Press
    Release dateApr 11, 2017
    ISBN9780226471730
    Unavailable
    Love of Country: A Journey through the Hebrides

    Related to Love of Country

    Related ebooks

    Europe Travel For You

    View More
    View More

    Related podcast episodes

    Related articles

    • Article

      A Magical Mystery Tour

      Aug 20, 2021

      A Magical Mystery Tour
      4 min read

    • Article

      A Dark Age Beacon

      Dec 6, 2018

      A Dark Age Beacon
      7 min read

    • Article

      Wild Things

      Jun 3, 2018

      The ground was spongy and green, the accents Irish, the light atmospheric and ‘soft’ (in other words, it was raining); the scene was set for a storytelling session about epic battles and strange worlds, good versus evil. Especially as we were standin

      3 min read

    • Article

      England’s Dreaming

      Sep 2, 2022

      England’s Dreaming
      6 min read

    • Article

      Life On The Edge

      Sep 20, 2023

      Life On The Edge
      4 min read

    • Article

      A Testament to Survival

      Sep 1, 2020

      A Testament to Survival
      7 min read

    • Article

      Wisdom Of The Ancients

      Oct 15, 2020

      Wisdom Of The Ancients
      5 min read

    • Article

      The Language of Home

      Sep 2, 2022

      The Language of Home
      3 min read

    • Article

      Ben Bulben

      Jan 21, 2022

      Ben Bulben
      3 min read

    • Article

      Commonplace Book

      Sep 3, 2019

      And that is why I do not like the news, because there has never been an era when so many things were going so right for so many of the wrong persons. —Ogden Nash, “Everybody Tells Me Everything,” The Face Is Familiar, 1941 Someone goes by wearing a

      3 min read

    • Article

      Triangle of Light

      Aug 25, 2022

      Triangle of Light
      10 min read

    • Article

      NOW & FOREVER

      Nov 28, 2022

      NOW & FOREVER
      13 min read

    • Article

      Following The Flow

      Aug 31, 2019

      Following The Flow
      11 min read

    • Article

      White Silence

      Dec 22, 2020

      White Silence
      5 min read

    • Article

      A Symposium on Deserts

      Mar 1, 2019

      A Symposium on Deserts
      24 min read

    • Article

      An Era In Fayetteville

      Aug 13, 2019

      An Era In Fayetteville
      6 min read

    Reviews for Love of Country

    4/5

    14 ratings1 review

    What did you think?

    Tap to rate

    Review must be at least 10 words

    • 4/5
      To describe the Outer Hebrides as remote is somewhat of an understatement. Even today it can take the best part of a day to get to, but once you are there you have reached not only some of the oldest parts of our planet, but also the epicentre of one of our country’s ancient cultures. This edgeland is the very periphery of our landscape and faces the full brunt of everything that the Atlantic can throw at it; even the summer can have five days of gales a month. This tough, uncompromising landscape shapes the place and the people that inhabit it.

      People belong to places, rather than place belong to people

      These islands have attracted a variety of people over the millennia. There were those who sought religious solitude on Iona and whilst there created the works of art that are the Book of Kells. Jura’s simple way of life gave George Orwell the space that he needed to create the dystopian horror that is 1984. The traditional way of life on the islands is formed as much by the landscape as it is by the language, and these tough, resilient people took those qualities with them as they left the islands either by choice or enforced by landowners. It is to this landscape that Bunting returns to countless times over six years, immersing herself into it, teasing out stories of the people and history and letting the place soak into her.

      ‘I couldn’t conceive of living on this land without getting my hands dirty. It keeps me connected with the place.’

      This is another really well written book by Bunting, she has managed to capture the very essence of the Outer Hebrides as she travels around and crosses the straits between the islands including a boat trip heads out to the Strait of Corryvreckan, the place where Orwell nearly drowned and is the location of one of the world’s most powerful whirlpools. Well worth reading.