John Buchan - Edinburgh Literary Pub Tour

John Buchan
1875 - 1940
Contents:
Biography.......................................................................................................................................................Pages 1 - 2
Contexts........................................................................................................................................................Pages 3 - 4
Further Reading / Contacts ................................................................................................................Pages 5 - 8
Biography:
John Buchan (1875-1940) bears the distinction of having led one of the fullest and most
accomplished lives of any Scottish writer. From his childhood as son of a Free Church
minister to his appointment as Governor-General of Canada, his career encompassed
publishing, journalism, the legal profession, the Houses of Parliament, the intelligence
service, the General Assembly of the Church of Scotland, and more than 100 published
books, including over 30 novels.
He was born in Perth, but moved around Scotland according to the requirements of
his father’s profession, from the industrial townscapes of Glasgow to the idyllic rural
landscapes of Broughton Green. Buchan showed early promise of his considerable
intellectual gifts and was awarded a scholarship to read Classics at Oxford where his
writing career began. He had published six novels by the time he left.
Leaving Oxford, he became a barrister and later took a position as a government
administrator with the High Commissioner for South Africa. His experiences there would
inform his later novel Prester John (1910).
When he came back to London, he continued to write his novels and work as a journalist.
In 1906 he took a position with publishers Oliver Nelson where he was responsible for
their Sixpenny Classics range of titles and the Nelson Sevenpenny Range of copyright
novels. He even contributed a few books of his own, including the 24 volume Nelson’s
History of the War
War, the royalties from which he donated to war charities. He would later
become director of the company.
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It was during this period that Buchan became closely involved with the Scottish literary
scene. He was a regular contributor to Blackwood’s in Edinburgh – the magazine later
serialised The Thirty-Nine Steps – and he became editor of the recently launched
magazine, The Scottish Review. He used his influence to try to bring about a revival in
Scottish writing, which had been in the doldrums since the death of Walter Scott Hugh
MacDiarmid was also attempting a Scottish literary revival, but from a different angle,
and the two writers, who were from completely different ends of the literary spectrum
(one a writer of thrillers, the other a diamond-minded poet), worked together for some
time. Buchan would eventually write the preface for MacDiarmid’s first book of poems
Sangschaw.
Sangschaw
Copyright 2003 © Scottish Literary Tour Trust. All Rights Reserved.
John Buchan
1875 - 1940
In 1912 Buchan became ill and during his recuperation in hospital wrote The ThirtyNine Steps (1915) which became a huge international best-seller, and later a celebrated
Hitchcock movie. It was the first of his novels to feature the heroic Richard Hannay, a
character who would appear in four more of Buchan’s novels, including Greenmantle
(1916).
When the First World War started Buchan was war correspondent for The Times.
Between 1916-17 he served on the Headquarters Staff of the British Army in France as
temporary Lieutenant Colonel.
His career did not stop there. From 1917-18 Buchan was Director of Information for the
Ministry of Information, and then for a short while after he was Director of Intelligence. In
1919 he was made a Director of Reuters, the international news agency.
In 1927 Buchan stood for Parliament and was elected MP for the Scottish Universities.
While in government he held a number of influential posts including his appointment,
from 1933-34, as His Majesty’s High Commissioner to the General Assembly of the
Church of Scotland. In 1935 he was made the first Baron Tweedsmuir and appointed
Governor-General of Canada. He moved there, and died five years later.
Buchan was an astoundingly prolific writer. He wrote poetry, historical romances, criticism,
journalism, and a textbook for accountants: The Law according to the Taxation of Foreign
Income. He wrote bestselling adventure novels like the Richard Hannay series. Another
series of adventure novels, which included The Powerhouse (1913), The Gap in the
Curtain (1932) and the posthumous Sick Heart River (1941) featured Sir Edward Leithan,
a gentleman lawyer and a decent chap who finds himself in difficult situations. Yet another
series of adventure novels had a retired Glasgow grocer as its daring protagonist.
In spite of his broad, polymathic brilliance, his enduring fame and world-wide appeal,
Buchan has been increasingly neglected in Scottish literature (find out why), though there
are signs that this trend is beginning to be reversed.
Buchan also wrote biographies of such diverse historical figures as Oliver Cromwell
(1934) and Sir Walter Scott (1932). Scott served as a kind of role model to Buchan,
who saw himself as someone who could have twin careers as a bestselling author and
establishment figure. He died in 1940.
2
Copyright 2003 © Scottish Literary Tour Trust. All Rights Reserved.
John Buchan
1875 - 1940
Contexts
‘Who would be James Joyce if they could be John Buchan?”
In 2001 best-selling crime writer Ian Rankin dedicated his book to Alan Massie, the
Scottish journalist and historical novelist responsible for the quotation above. But what
did Massie mean? The answer leads us to another question – when does writing become
literature?
John Buchan occupies a curious place in Scottish literature. His name is well known, his
books continue to be read throughout the world, yet you won’t hear his name mentioned
among the ‘great and the good’ of modern Scottish writing – the ‘literary canon’, as it is
often referred to. People do not readily associate Buchan’s work with Hugh MacDiarmid
or Neil Gunn – yet he played a significant role in bringing Scottish literature out from
under the shadow of Scott and Stevenson. You won’t hear mention of any of his works
in a discussion of the great Scottish novels of the 20th century, among the likes of Lewis
Grassic Gibbon, Neil Gunn, or Alasdair Gray – yet his suspense novels influenced
generations of thriller writers. You might hear him as a footnote to a discussion of
suspense and crime fiction – which would include Ian Rankin, Ian Fleming, John Le Carré
among others – but that seems to serve to marginalise him even further, and exclude
discussion of Buchan as a ‘serious’ writer. The popular impression of Buchan is that he
wrote crime stories, one of which got made into a famous Hitchcock film.
We can speculate the reasons for this. His life, lived mostly outside Scotland, does not fit
well with our perception of how a Scottish man of letters should behave. Buchan was
quick to join the British Establishment: beginning with a scholarship to Oxford (“nursery
for the youth of the land” as he describes it in an article in the Glasgow Herald) then to
an appointment on the staff of Lord Milner, High Commissioner to South Africa, his work
writing propaganda material for the Ministry of Information, his election as a Conservative
MP; and finally his assignment as Lord Tweedsmuir, Governor-General of Canada. It is
difficult to define him as a specifically Scottish writer, but this probably has more to do
with nationalistic chauvinism than anything else.
3
Is it because he spent so much time in England? Robert Louis Stevenson spent much
of his adult life away from his home country yet he occupies a central place in the
Scottish literary tradition – perhaps it is because the themes of Stevenson’s work are
quintessentially Scottish, firmly rooted in a Gothic sensibility. Stevenson is seen as an
integral part of the Scottish literary tradition; Buchan isn’t.
Perhaps Buchan spread his talent too wide, published too much. A “Jack of all trades;
master of none”: the damning phrase for anyone seen to be over-achieving in more than
one discipline. Was he a victim of his own success? Perhaps if he had concentrated on
the biographies we would remember him as a first class biographer. If he’d only written
Copyright 2003 © Scottish Literary Tour Trust. All Rights Reserved.
John Buchan
1875 - 1940
historical books, he might have been remembered as one of Scotland’s great historians.
If he’d kept his career horizons strictly within the publishing industry then we might
remember him as the magazine editor who collaborated with Hugh MacDiarmid and
helped get his career off the ground. Perhaps Buchan’s problem is he was too successful,
did too much.
Above everything he achieved in his remarkable life, Buchan is most famous for The
Thirty-Nine Steps,
Steps a slim book written during a period of convalescence in hospital, which
had enormous influence in the development of the thriller/ suspense genre. Reading it
now we may squirm at some of the corny sounding dialogue or descriptions, and a lot
of the historical background may be meaningless to us. The suspense novel is a form
of writing which dates very quickly, as it often relies on contemporary events. More
disquietingly, we feel very uncomfortable at the anti-Semitism which pervades the novel as
well as a certain top-down world view – these may have been representative of certain
attitudes prevalent and acceptable in Buchan’s day, but they strike a jarring note with
modern readers. His representation of local characters’ speech in dialect contrasts with
the easy ‘official’ English of his hero and has the effect of patronising them, and rendering
them ‘colourful’ local oddities rather than ‘real’ characters. Many writers since Buchan
have made it their life’s work to rid literature of these linguistic anomalies which serve to
marginalise local dialects and language.
Despite this, however, we are struck by how easily these misgivings are swept away once
we become sucked into the plot. The Thirty-Nine Steps is an excellently paced and
plotted novel that, like the best in the genre, keeps you hooked until the end.
Perhaps Buchan’s enduring fame as a thriller writer is where Buchan loses his claim to be
among the great and the good of Scottish literature. And here we find ourselves in the
controversial territory between popular fiction and literature: when is writing literature
and when is it just writing?
What makes a work like Sunset Song endure? What makes the novels of Neil Gunn shine
like jewels from the past, when the work of Alasdair MacLean – a thriller writer from
Glasgow and one of the most popular novelists in the world until the mid-1970s – is all
but forgotten? James Kelman and Alasdair Gray continue to be celebrated, studied and
read widely, while their contemporary William McIlvanney, another massive seller, fades
from memory.
4
Perhaps this is what Alan Massie meant. James Joyce may be revered and worshipped the
world over for his crazy, towering masterpieces of dazzling linguistic ingenuity – but does
he genuinely have claim to a popular readership? It takes weeks of hard work and the use
of a good lending library to get anywhere with Ulysses and Finnegans Wake – but you’d
read The Thirty-Nine Steps in one enjoyable afternoon. Joyce is the genius, but Buchan has
more readers. Maybe that’s the ultimate difference between ‘literature’ and just writing.
Written By Colin Clark
Copyright 2003 © Scottish Literary Tour Trust. All Rights Reserved.
John Buchan
1875 - 1940
Further Reading
Websites
Introduction
Overview of Buchan’s life & work
http://www.kirjasto.sci.fi/buchan.htm
John Buchan Society
This is really a web-site for researchers & academics but has lots of useful information.
http://www.johnbuchansociety.co.uk
Napier University
Good background material & links to Blackwood’s magazine pages.
http://www.pmpc.napier.ac.uk/scob/buchan.htm
Glasgow University
Interesting (though fairly academic) discussion article about Buchan’s work & life.
http://www.gla.ac.uk:443/avenue/19/16johnbu.htm
The following websites will be of general interest to the student of Scottish literature:
Scottish Literary Tour Trust
Featuring an extensive section on the Makars’ Literary Tour
http://www.scot-lit-tour.co.uk
National Library of Scotland
http://www.nls.uk/
Scottish Poetry Library
A very attractively laid out website with information on some of the major poets of the
20th century along with detailed readings of their best-known works.
http://www.spl.org.uk/index.html
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SLAINTE
The name stands for Scottish Librarians Across the Internet. This excellent site features
brief, well-written biographies of many of the great Scottish writers.
http://www.slainte.org.uk/Scotauth/scauhome.htm
Scots Online
From essays to an online dictionary this is a web-based resource with everything you
could possibly need to know about the Scots language and how it is used.
http://www.scots-online.org/
Copyright 2003 © Scottish Literary Tour Trust. All Rights Reserved.
John Buchan
1875 - 1940
Shudder at the Niffer
An essay in Scots about Scots.
http://www.fleimin.demon.co.uk/Bletherskite/Shudder_At_The_Niffer.htm
Gaelic & Scottish Connections
A resource on Gaelic language and culture, featuring poetry and essays and an online
dictionary.
http://www.gaelicscottish.com/
Electric Scotland
Electric Scotland is a real mixed bag of Scottish paraphernalia with nationalist overtones.
This page in particular allows you to hear and read complete Scots poems, from
MacDiarmid to Dunbar.
http://www.electricscotland.com/si/features/scots/complete.htm
Literature links
An encyclopaedic web of links to Scots magazines, monuments, libraries and languages.
http://www.burryman.com/scotland.html - lit
Project Gutenberg
This is a web-based publisher of copyright expired books.
http://www.ibiblio.org/gutenberg/cgi-bin/sdb/t9.cgi/
Poetry Archive
A good, user-friendly site, sponsored by a bookseller, which features examples from some
of the best poets in the world.
http://www.poetry-archive.com/
Poem Index
Almost 900 poems in the English language from 13th to 19th centuries.
http://tcsu.trin.cam.ac.uk/~john/pgbev/html-interface/full-index.html
Representative Poetry On-line
An enormous and easy to use resource based at the University of Toronto featuring
alphabetical and chronological lists of 450 poets with substantial selections of their work.
http://eir.library.utoronto.ca/rpo/display/poet42.html
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Scottish PEN
The name stands for Poets, Playwrights, Editors, Essayists and Novelists and exists to
promote the friendly co-operation between writers in the interests of freedom of
expression throughout the world.
http://www.scottishpen.org/
Copyright 2003 © Scottish Literary Tour Trust. All Rights Reserved.
John Buchan
1875 - 1940
Writers’ Portraits
Photographic and biographical pen portraits of some of Scotland’s greatest contemporary
writers.
http://www.nls.uk/writestuff/
Anthologies
The Book of Prefaces
edited and glossed by Alasdair Gray
Bloomsbury (2000)
Every home should have one. Dust jacket contains this advice: “Warning to Parents,
Teachers, Librarians, Booksellers. Do not let smart children handle this book. It will help
them pass examinations without reading anything else.”
The Faber Book of Twentieth Century Scottish Poetry
Edited by Douglas Dunn
Faber & Faber (1992)
A detailed account of the dramatic transformations the Scottish verse underwent in the
previous century, with an enlightening introduction by Dunn.
The New Penguin Book of Scottish Verse
edited by Robert Crawford and Mick Imlah
Penguin (2000)
A beautifully presented chronology of some of the greatest Scottish poetry, from the 6th
century to the present.
The Penguin Book of Scottish Verse
edited by Tom Scott
Penguin (1970)
Earlier incarnation of above, edited by Scott – a recent inductee to Makars’ Court.
Contains the infamous and controversial rude verse attributed to Burns. Makes for an
interesting comparison with Crawford & Imlah’s anthology.
An Anthology of Scottish Women Poets
Edited by Catherine Kerrigan
Edinburgh University Press (1991)
Covers folksong, ballad, Scots and Anglo-Scots, from the middle ages to contemporary poets.
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Studies and Criticism
Scottish Literature
eds Douglas Gifford, et al
Edinburgh University Press (2002)
Copyright 2003 © Scottish Literary Tour Trust. All Rights Reserved.
John Buchan
1875 - 1940
This is all just about all you need to know about Scottish literature. A comprehensive, and
very readable book. Excellent.
The Mainstream Companion to Scottish Literature
Trevor Royle
Mainstream (1993)
Alphabetically arranged standard reference on Scottish literature.
Modern Scottish Literature
Alan Bold
Longman (1983)
Learned, erudite discussion of the major writers and texts of Scottish literature in the 20th
century. Brilliant study material for Higher English.
Imagine a City: Glasgow In Fiction
Moira Burgess
Argyll (1998)
The definitive work on Glasgow’s place in Scottish literature, written by the author of the
Makars Court Tour script.
A History of Scottish Women’s Writing
edited by Douglas Gifford and Dorothy McMillan
Edinburgh University Press (1997)
This is the best book around for Scottish women’s writing at the moment. Tone can be a
bit academic in places.
Contacts
For further information about this project contact:
Morris Paton
Scottish Literary Tour Trust.
Suite 2
97b West Bow
Edinburgh
EH1 2JP
8
E-mail: info@scot-lit-tour.co.uk
Web: www.scot-lit-tour.co.uk
Copyright 2003 © Scottish Literary Tour Trust. All Rights Reserved.