Argyllshire Advertiser
An impression of the planned education room, by Reiach & Hall Architects.
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JAMES HOGG defies categorisation. A prolific poet, songwriter, playwright, novelist, short-story writer and parodist, he wrote with equal skill in Scots and English.
Labelled the Ettrick Shepherd, the former Borders farmhand, whose life spanned the 18th and 19th centuries, befriended many of the great writers of his day, including Walter Scott, John Galt and Allan Cunningham.
Even though he was celebrated off and on in his own lifetime, some details of the author’s life remain unclear. Records place his baptism on December 9 1770, but Hogg long believed that he had been born on January 25 1772 Burns Night, no less.
This complicates attempts to commemorate his 250th birthday, unless we embrace his fantastical world view. Fiction mattered to him more than fact. Besides, Hogg’s sestercentennial will inevitably be overshadowed by Scott’s own such celebration on August 15 this year.
Despite little formal education, Hogg wrote one of the finest novels in Scottish literature, a disturbing tale of the divided self that still resonates.
Sir William Macpherson, judge whose 1999 report found the Metropolitan Police was institutionally racist – obituary
His inquiry into the police investigation into the killing of Stephen Lawrence was blamed by some on the Right for harming race relations
16 February 2021 • 8:15am
Macpherson in 1997, when the inquiry he was to lead was announced by the home secretary, Jack Straw
Credit: Roy Letkey
Sir William Macpherson of Cluny, who has died aged 94, was the 27th Chief of Clan Macpherson and a High Court judge from 1983 to 1996; he was, though, largely unknown to the wider public until he chaired the inquiry in 1997 into “matters arising from the death of Stephen Lawrence”.