News of the Dead

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In ancient Pictland, the Christian hermit Conach contemplates God and nature, performs miracles and prepares himself for sacrifice. Long after his death, legends about him are set down by an unknown hand in the Book of Conach. Speaking to Baxter by Loch Lee in the film, Robertson says, “You come to a place like this and you find that your fiction is echoing things that really did happen.” These two quotes sum it up: ‘The story of a quiet unnoticed place where there are few people, fewer memories and almost no reliable records - a place such as Glen Conach…when you return to the present it may seem fact and fiction were never that discrete from one another after all.’ I interview James about his bok in the first episode of The Big Scottish Book Club which you can view on BBC iPlayer or follow this link: The only copy of this book is kept in the library of the laird of Glen Conach, until it is destroyed by fire centuries later. Excerpts from the translated version of the book are included within the novel.

News of the Dead (Short 2021) - IMDb News of the Dead (Short 2021) - IMDb

In the film, Baxter follows Robertson from his home in Newtyle to Glen Esk in search of an ancient cross stone captured in a postcard, once given to the novelist by a neighbour. The stone is said to have been carved by a pupil of the real life seventh-century Glen Esk hermit, Saint Drostan. Not sure why that matters either but there is a real sense of place to this book. I'd describe it as a set of stories around a fictional, very remote Glen near Forfar, and it's history and legend. And it's also about history, and what that means: what we can read and trust, and what we read and have to decide if we trust or not. News of the Dead is a captivating exploration of refuge, retreat and the reception of strangers. It measures the space between the stories people tell of themselves - what they forget and what they invent - and the stories through which they may, or may not, be remembered. The first of these stories is of the Christian hermit Conach. In ancient Pictland, Conach contemplates God and nature. For a while he is accompanied by Talorg who serves him. Conach performs miracles and prepares himself for sacrifice. And after his death, legends about him are written by an anonymous person in the Book of Conach.In the early nineteenth century, self-promoting antiquarian Charles Kirkliston Gibb has himself invited to Glen Conach, to the big house where the laird, his lady and daughter live. Gibb undertakes to translate the Book of Conach. It is in Gibb’s interest to prolong the translation for as long as possible: he has nowhere else to stay. And in time he becomes involved with Jessamine, the laird’s daughter. Jessamine convinces Gibb to include some stories from the local oral tradition. Reading Scotland is an innovative Edinburgh International Book Festival project to find new ways to understand Scotland in a post-Covid era. Six Scottish authors were each invited to work closely with a filmmaker to create a short film inspired by their book. The films will be presented at the Book Festival this month alongside a conversation with each of the authors. This project is intended as a collaborative, internationally-minded exploration of how new Scottish writing and film-making can help citizens understand this country, its writing and its identity. Reading Scotland is supported by the Scottish Government’s Edinburgh Festivals Expo Fund.

News of the Dead - Penguin Books UK

Deep in the mountains of north-east Scotland lies Glen Conach, a place of secrets and memories, fable and history. In particular, it holds the stories of three different eras, separated by centuries yet linked by location, by an ancient manuscript and by echoes that travel across time. What a marvellous novel this is. Three different time periods mostly presented to us though the Book of Conach, the journal of Gibb, and Maja’s letter. Each have found refuge in Glen Conach, each is known to us through stories presented. And each story is incomplete. What do we really know about Conach? How much can we rely on Gibb’s incomplete journal? And, while Maja is still alive, her own early childhood is lost to her. Catholicism hasn’t, however, been completely banished: people like Will’s mother still attend clandestine masses. Mary, Queen of Scots has stayed loyal to the Old Religion and although she has abdicated the Scottish throne, stands a chance of taking over the English one. Meanwhile, Esme Stuart, James VI’s mentor, makes no bones about being a Catholic, and may even be plotting a Counter-Reformation. Scotland looks like being Protestant, but what kind of Protestant: Puritan or humanist? And could it not just as easily be Catholic, English (like the 1574 troops pulling the cannon to lay siege to the Castle) French (like the Queen) or (a bit of a push, this) British? This book looks at the ways stories are passed on through generations, how they connect the past and present, how they change and evolve with each retelling. And yet there is still that principle of truth which validates them. James Robertson weaves a compelling story with legends, beliefs and traditions from three different time periods. There was an element of mystery as I wondered what connected the three parts of the story, with Maja’s story from the contemporary strand being particularly intriguing. There aren't enough stars for this book--it is beautiful, playful and profound. Historical fiction that plays with the idea of history itself.Made by award winning filmmaker Anthony Baxter, the short documentary/drama follows Robertson as he explores the writing of his new novel News of the Dead, which is set in the fictional Glen Conach. Published by Penguin this month, the book features characters set hundreds of years apart, but all linked by the same place: an ancient hermit, a nineteenth-century charlatan and, in the present day, the Glen’s eldest resident whose young schoolboy friend thinks he’s seen a ghost. Details of that stay are filtered to us through Gibb’s warts-and-all journal. Two other main narrative threads are woven around it. One is Gibb’s translation of the Book of Conach. Originally written in Latin about 800 years ago, the book chronicles the life of the “blessed and venerable” Conach, who performed miracles for his fellow Picts in “the north country” before devoting himself completely to God by becoming a hermit. Interestingly the book had me thinking about faith also and how it is important especially when faced with the prospect of death or loss. How someone dies two deaths; one when their soul leaves this earth and one when their name is said for the last time. The only way to preserve someone’s legacy is to write it down. To pass on long after even you have left this earth. To ensure you leave your mark in this world.

Book review: News of the Dead, by James Robertson - The Scotsman

News of the Dead is certainly far from dull and the author manages to pull off several different styles, including passages in Scots dialect for the stories told by the irrepressible and accommodating Geordie Kemp, who never likes to disappoint a listener. In 2013, James Robertson wrote a story a day: 365 tales, each one 365 words long. They were published in one volume the following year. Some stories were nothing more than light sketches, pithy squibs and fleeting impressions. However, many made a little go a long way and showcased experiments in form and a diverse array of subject matter, whether ballads, monologues, fake obituaries, replayed dreams or restyled fairy tales. In one entry, a writer describes his more inventive fables: “They’re the stories I let out in the open, the ones I slip off the leash.” The three stories are quite different. In the early Middle Ages in Pictland, there’s the Christian hermit, Conach, whose signs and miracles performed in Glen are made legendary through ancient writings in a text known as “The Book of Conach.” Generations later in the 19th century, an antiquarian called Charles Kirkliston Gibb, is drawn to Glen Conach to transcribe and translate The Book of Conach, and in turn is taken into the grand home of the Baron of Glen Conach and his frenzied household. And then there’s the present-day reflections of Maja, an elderly woman who has lived in the Glen for most of her life and her relationship to a young boy, called Lachie, who claims to have seen a ghost. I don't see a lot of decent Scottish fiction. I don't know if it's just not there, or I've just not noticed it. You get a few thrillers, and there's been the odd notable one (your Shuggie Bains and My Bloody Projects) but there aren't many. And this is a very Scottish book - in a good way.Deep down, I knew that Henry VIII couldn’t possibly have died while jousting because it was only 1536 and he still had another four and a half wives to go, but such was the clarity of Mantel’s depiction of the scene and the confidence of her writing from within Cromwell’s skull that it excised this knowledge from my own. The king had indeed been seriously wounded – so much so that it altered his whole character – but he was merely unconscious, not dead. Cromwell, taking command of the scene, shouted out the news. ‘“Long live the king!” Thomas bellows (thinking “God save Thomas Cromwell”).’ The stories are of a modern day old lady, and how she got there; a three hundred year old diary of a traveller to the glen, and a historical tract about a saint from the Pictish times which said traveller is translating.

David Robinson reviews: News of the Dead, Rizzio and Rose David Robinson reviews: News of the Dead, Rizzio and Rose

Gibb keeps his head down translating the Book of Conach and shows his face at mealtimes. After a while he becomes fond of the Baron and his family – his wife Margaret, his daughter Jessie – and deceives them to extend his stay. But when Jessie rumbles him, he finds himself under her sway and faced with an offer he is unable to refuse. Set in the fictional setting of “Glen Conach” in the North East of Scotland, Robertson in his classic style combines three narratives from characters across different centuries, tied together by their connection to the Glen, creating a tale which is steeped in myth, folklore and legend.

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I’ve been thinking about it for about five years, so it’s taken a while for it to come together. I wanted to write a novel that was set in one place, but that took place over a huge amount of time. So I invented this glen, Glen Conach, which is, in my head, not far from where I live. There are three stories going on: the story of Conach himself, an 8th-century Christian missionary to the Picts who becomes a hermit in the glen; then a story set in the early 1800s, where Charles Gibb comes to the big house in the glen to look at this manuscript about the life of Conach; and finally a modern story narrated by a woman called Maya, one of the oldest residents of the glen in the year 2020.