The Raucle Tongue: Selected Essays, Journalism and Interviews

The third and final volume of McDiarmid’s previously uncollected prose covers the decades from 1937 to 1978. This text includes: assessments of the contemporary political and literary scene, from the Spanish Civil War through MacDiarmid’s call for an independent Republican Scotland; articles on Lewis Grassic Gibbon, John Maclean, Vladimir Mayakovsky and Norman MacCaig; tributes to James Joyce, Ezra Pound, Dylan Thomas, Cecil Gray and Joseph Conrad; a criticism of Billy Graham; and a series of pieces criticising those who MacDiarmid considered traitors in the Scottish national movement. The book concludes with a selection of retrospective and autumnal interviews, as the author looks back over his literary, political, and personal career. Glen Murray also provides details about MacDiamid’s publications and commentary. The collection is the tenth volume to be published as part of Carcanet’s MacDiarmid 2000 programme.