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Books

Re: Books

Postby boriselbrus » Wed Jun 08, 2022 9:18 pm

Cairngorm John by John Allen is well worth a read.
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Re: Books

Postby AyrshireAlps » Thu Jun 09, 2022 8:50 am

It's a great book, but not exactly light hearted!
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Re: Books

Postby Caberfeidh » Thu Jun 09, 2022 10:41 am

"The Ridiculous Mountains and Nothing So Simple As Climbing" - the Complete Doctor Stories by GJF Dutton. Two books now bound in one volume. Witty and entertaining stories featuring hill -walking characters we can all recognise.
https://www.googleadservices.com/pagead/aclk?sa=L&ai=DChcSEwjHmvLqiaD4AhXW7e0KHVuuAYsYABAEGgJkZw&ae=2&ohost=www.google.com&cid=CAASJORo-5HHId4qm1_5_eFuSIxo8ehUnb70fhdWHh8Aa2gNd8Ohug&sig=AOD64_1NpgGfL9P9HdGBsGnFjyLpVWOpLw&ctype=5&q=&ved=2ahUKEwiG9ObqiaD4AhWId8AKHQxdBjYQ9aACKAB6BAgBEE8&adurl=
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Re: Books

Postby Colin1951 » Thu Jun 09, 2022 7:49 pm

Everyone should read “Mountaineering in Scotland “ and “Undiscovered Scotland “ by WH Murray. Very old but an absolute classic. It doesn’t set out to be a humorous book but has some good wee touches.

Also Tom Patey’s “One Man’s Mountains”. A bothy weekend with Patey must have been a riot!

And I can’t remember th author’s name - but the Ascent of Rum Doodle is a completely ridiculous lampoon of the Himalayan scene.
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Re: Books

Postby Chris Henshall » Thu Jun 09, 2022 9:03 pm

Buchan's John MacNab is a superb book. It is flavoured by the attitudes of the time but it has a real sense of location, tells a gripping tale and provides a picture of highland social structuring, even if the view is from above.


Fair enough, Wee Davie. I wrote a review of it several years ago and have dug it out here in case it might be of interest:
A combination of period piece and ripping yarn
This is an entertaining yarn but what strikes you more than anything else – reading it nearly 100 years after it was first published in 1925 – are the underlying assumptions in the text. For, of course, Buchan was writing at a time when men over the age of 21 and women over the age of 30 (if they owned property) had only recently become entitled to vote, when everyone knew their place and it didn’t really occur to the ruling classes to question whether or not they were entitled to the economic, political and social power which they wielded. As a result, class and privilege seep off every page and the modern reader feels that any one of Buchan’s leading characters (and possibly Buchan himself) is only a stone’s throw away from endorsing ideas like eugenics and homophobia or making a case that “slavery wasn’t all bad, y’know, old chap!” And, of course, a novel based on fishin’, huntin’ and shootin’ isn’t going to be to everyone’s taste.
Equally, some of the writing is rather dated and can be unintentionally very amusing – as when we read that, on meeting Fish Benjie for the first time, Janet Raden has a hopeless weakness for small boys.
Two things, however, save it from being simply a period piece.
First, Buchan has a genuine ability to tell a story – the book is still a page turner – while his evocative descriptions of the Scottish mountain environment are as good as anyone else’s and better than most.
Second, the book is littered with signs that Buchan is waking up to the emerging post (first) war consensus that privilege and even unearned wealth are no longer defensible. When, for example, Lord Lamancha delivers his political address in Muirtown, Buchan emphasises that it is a triumph of style over substance while Janet Raden tells Archie Roylance very firmly that, “Nobody in the world to-day has a right to anything which he can't justify.” although, of course, she does go on to qualify her provocative statement by adding, “I don't mean that we want some silly government redistributing everybody's property.” She (and, by extension, Buchan) are, however, clearly aware that the old order is changing and greater egalitarianism is probably on the way. Good!
So, in summary, by modern standards this is pretty poor and, if it were written today, it would almost certainly not be published – but that doesn’t mean that it shouldn’t be read!

More broadly, I reckon that Isolation Shepherd by Iain Thomson is a more interesting book to stick in a rucksack for a wander about the hills and other people on the thread have mentioned lots of other good books - Allen, Borthwick, Hewitt, Murray, Patey, etc. All good!
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Re: Books

Postby Boris_the_Bold » Sun Aug 07, 2022 1:21 am

The First Fifty by Muriel Gray is/was very funny (though I’m not sure if it’s still in print) and ‘The Munros in Winter’ by the late great Martin Moran is a must-read for anyone who is interested in winter hill-walking in Scotland. Neither include any advice about taking dogs up hills.

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Re: Books

Postby lucid nonsense » Sun Aug 07, 2022 8:36 am

Hamish Brown writes about hiking and climbing with a dog. He takes his dog with him in "Hamish's Groats End Walk, and there's an anecdote in one book (I'm not sure if it's that one or a different one) about taking a dog to the top of the Inn Pin.

The best outdoor book I've read recently is Overlander by Alan Brown. It's very readable, though he is on a bike and there is no dog.
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Re: Books

Postby JohnZD » Sun Aug 07, 2022 8:58 am

On and off topic, but Sick Heart River by John Buchan is one of my favourite books, based in Canada and Buchans last book.
For a great read, the Boardman Tasker Omnibus is ace.
Also with all the new hooha re the Everest 1924 expedition, I’m finding Michael Tracey’s videos on YouTube compulsory viewing
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Re: Books

Postby Sgurr » Sun Aug 07, 2022 10:47 am

The Ascent of Rum Doodle is a take off of most of the serious expedition mountaineering books abroad that I had ever read .
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Re: Books

Postby Glyno » Sun Aug 07, 2022 11:44 am

The First Fifty

by Muriel Gray
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Re: Books

Postby HalfManHalfTitanium » Sun Aug 07, 2022 11:57 am

Sgurr wrote:The Ascent of Rum Doodle is a take off of most of the serious expedition mountaineering books abroad that I had ever read .


Absolutely!

The perfect antidote to all those climbing and walking narratives that take themselves so seriously.
Rum Doodle.jpg
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Re: Books

Postby WalkWithWallace » Sun Aug 07, 2022 4:09 pm

I don't read nearly enough books but I did enjoy Peter Kemp's, Of Big Hills and Wee Men and Muriel Gray's First 50 Munros was decent too.
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Re: Books

Postby Giant Stoneater » Sun Aug 07, 2022 4:36 pm

Not books but a fanzine, the Angry Corrie which started in 1991 and finished in 2008 has been has just been republished on the web, though you will need to register.
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Re: Books

Postby prog99 » Sun Aug 07, 2022 6:40 pm

Giant Stoneater wrote:Not books but a fanzine, the Angry Corrie which started in 1991 and finished in 2008 has been has just been republished on the web, though you will need to register.

Or visit the bogs Keiloch.
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Re: Books

Postby gav777 » Tue Aug 09, 2022 1:39 pm

JohnZD wrote:On and off topic, but Sick Heart River by John Buchan is one of my favourite books, based in Canada and Buchans last book.
For a great read, the Boardman Tasker Omnibus is ace.


Agree with both of those - saw Buchan in a new light after reading that. Rather dark in some ways.

Giant Stoneater wrote:Not books but a fanzine, the Angry Corrie which started in 1991 and finished in 2008 has been has just been republished on the web, though you will need to register.


Do you have a link ?

I did enjoy this short interview whilst searching myself :
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