I’ve developed a tradition over recent years, when travelling back from Scotland by train. At Glasgow I now pop into Borders in Buchanan Street and look for a book that I can read on the way back to Birmingham. The book has to be one that’s connected with Scotland – it keeps the feel of the break going that little bit longer. The book has to be short enough to read during the three hour or so journey to Birmingham and has o be something that I would not normally buy.
A couple of weeks ago, on my return from my trip to the Cairngorms, I picked up a real cracker.
Calum’s Road is a simply wonderful book, detailing the life and work of crofter Calum Mcleod who lived on the Herbridean island of Rossay. Calum was one of those men of the Highlands who can turn their hand to almost anything. During his life he developed the first electric light system in the north of the island – using a wind turbine, looked after the lighthouse, worked as a crofter and a fisherman and even found time to do things like grow tobacco plants in his green house. Calum’s philosophy was to be as self sufficient as possible. He didn’t smoke himself but realised that some of the older fellows were having trouble with their supply, so he grew his own. It was – they said – the lightest, finest, tobacco they had smoked.
But Calum’s greatest achievement was his road. For much of his life Calum campaigned for the building of a small road that would connect the south of the island with his small settlement in the north. Every campaign fell of deaf ears and so – at the age when most people are looking to retire – Calum decided to build his own road. The road (which was, of course, completed) has become quite famous and the achievement is worth celebrating in a book.
But there is much more to Roger Hutchinson’s book than the building of the road. We hear about the history of the island and the suffering of the community as one absentee landowner after another cleared the land to support sheep farming. We relive a number of commissions that came to the islands to explore the true life of crofting. This was a hard life, not just because of the climate and the land. One landowner actually built a kind of Berlin-wall across the island to keep the natives to the North and away from the land now dominated by the sheep.
I haven’t really got time to say more about this book, but if traditional life of the Hebrides interests you then rush out and buy it. This is a fascinating story about a fascinating place and an amazing man called Calum.
Great reading.
Calum’s Road, (Birlinn Ltd). Paperback. £7.99
You wait forever, and then all the buses (or through-hikers) come at the same time!
I’m a graphic designer by trade, and last year put together Calum MacLeòid’s own narrative, Fà sachadh An-Iochdmhor Ratharasair. The title translates as “The Cruel Clearance of Raasayâ€. He outlines the history of the Raasay evictions (often in scathing terms) and follows the trail of those who had to leave Raasay and adjacent islands.
Written entirely in Scots Gaelic, there is a translation into English by his daughter, Julia Allen. I chose to place the material on facing pages, so that readers can go back and forth between the Gaelic and English, should they so choose. The work is the primary source material for the historical portions of Roger Hutchinson’s excellent book.
You can but the book directly from http://www.gaelicbooks.org Price is £8.50
I might have known you were involved in this somewhere
Hope to see you when I get back Humph. Meanwhile, may the power of Calum go with you!
I’m keeping quiet, but I’ve relatives on both sides from the area. Some of my Dad’s folk were from Raasay, and some of my Mum’s from Flada (north of Raasay). They are hoping to visit in the next couple of years.
I’ve Norma MacLeod’s “Raasay: The Island and its people” with notes that my Mum left me to add to our family forest.
I knew you were a man of rare pedigree Duncan