You are viewing your 1 free article this month. Login to read more articles.
The First Minister of Scotland Nicola Sturgeon has written an introduction for Canongate’s reissue of Scottish classic Sunset Song by Lewis Grassic Gibbon.
The new edition will be published on 6th February in hardback at £12.99, following a serialisation in the New Statesman on Friday (31st January).
Canongate said: "In her brand new introduction Nicola Sturgeon highlights the importance of Sunset Song to Scottish identity, and discusses the formative impact it has had upon her own life. This pivotal classic of Scottish literature, with its portrayal of a nation in turmoil, feels more relevant now than ever."
The synopsis reads: "Faced with a choice between a harsh farming life and the world of books and learning, Chris Guthrie chooses to remain in her rural community, bound by her intense love of the land. But everything changes with the arrival of the First World War and Chris finds her land altered beyond recognition."
Sturgeon said in her introduction: "If this new edition is prompting you to re-read Sunset Song after many years, as I have just done, you will find it has lost none of its appeal and emotion. And if you are about to read this remarkable novel for the first time, you are embarking on a profound journey."
Gibbon is the pen-name of James Leslie Mitchell. Born and brought up in the rich farming land of northern Scotland, he wrote novels, short stories and essays and had 17th full-length books published before his death in 1935 at the age of 33.