Diana Gabaldon at Edinburgh book festival 2022

 

Diana Gabaldon in Edinburgh

 •    NEW BOOK – Go Tell the Bees That I Am Gone

(we must tell the bees if something important is happening.) 

 About rebuilding the house on the ridge – with a third floor as a refuge.  She said this book is like a snake – she only knows where it is going a third of the way through. To  preserve what they love, and loop through the woods and time, always back to the Ridge. About “Loyalty”

 

She spoke of  keeping the Gaelic culture alive. 

For her first two books she was getting Gaelic from a dictionary. Ian Taylor got in touch with her and did translations. They were afraid Gaelic would be a dead language in ten years – “It would not be because we didn’t try.” She said, and Gabaldon was quite emotional over this. 

 

She has been in recent times one of the most significant people for Scotland’s soft power on the world stage.  She hopes there has been a Gaelic culture revival.

 (She would certainly enjoy Niteworks, who perform with beautiful Gaelic singers, I highly recommend.)

 

She is now writing book ten, and perhaps the last in this long running saga. While the first books were set in Scotland , the more recent seasons have been set in America, on the Mackenzie Ridge. In this way she has melded her own unusual roots – Mexican and English - with the important contributions  the Scots made in the early years of  European settlements in America before the wars of Independence. .

 

Her books are on the Number One best sellers list.

 As a child she read Disney comics and later thought, I could write better stories – so she wrote to the magazine editor. – Her first comic book was Scrooge McDuck.

G spoke of her writing process - ‘who is this character and what do they want.” The people are real for me she said. She enjoys the research process too and walking on battlefields, which are very spiritual. The research plus what appeals to me. 

 

After the fact storylines and shaping. She references her earlier books with delicate engineering, picking up the threads and little bits of the pattern.

 

130K book sales of her first edition. – and she has managed to stay ahead of the TV show. 

She is now writing on a prequel, of Brianna and Allan, Jamie’s parents and the Jacobites. 

 

She worked in research Arizona state university. 

Gabaldon studied Zoology, marine biology, and a PHD in behavioral ecology. Later she wrote

software reviews and technical articles for computer publications, as well as popular-science articles and Disney comics. She was a professor with an expertise in scientific computation at ASU for 12 years before leaving to write full-time.

 

And yes the Kilt inspiration!  

Season 6 Outlander

To set up Scotland’s very own media

 

worldwide success of Outlander

Scottish Media and Broadcasting. To set up Scotland’s very own media! Yes

 

When the British Broadcasting Corporation BBC, was set up 1933, its strange that Scotland, an ancient nation begun 9th century, did not insist on its own media – when Scotland has always kept its church, Scots law, education and with its four ancient universities. 

Its been a cultural disaster for Scotland writes Paul Scott Henderson in his book on the Scottish Enlightenment. 

 

After recommendations by the Advisory Council for Arts Scotland 1981, initiated by the Saltire Society - some arts councils have set up here – The Scottish Arts Council (Creative Scotland), National Theatre of Scotland, Scottish National Portrait Gallery, (nearly closed), 

 

Nearly all Scottish arts councils have been run by English directors. Andrew Dixon, who ran the National galleries wanted to remove all Scottish art as he believed it was inferior and close the Scottish National Portrait gallery – but there was such an outcry and protest in Edinburgh, instead the historic building in Queen street was refurbished and reopened in 2014.

 

Henderson writes, “The problem is that many Scots children go through their entire time at school and learn nothing of their own Scottish culture, history or arts. This is shocking as most countries teach their national culture. Instead Scots learn about English culture which teaches them to feel second rate and inferior.” 

 

I have my own personal experience.

When I lived in the States, I had no idea I should be proud to be Scots – of the Scottish rich heritage – (even though I studied higher history)! I know Scots had made a few inventions. I knew of Robert the Bruc but I had no idea of the Scottish enlightenment. 

Brian Cox in Succession

James McAvoy

“Scotland’s government is responsible for Scotland’s culture, but has to ignore the most influential means of cultural expression. All the small, newly independent, nations of Europe have their own broadcasting and even the state of Catalonia has its own four tv channels.”

 

Are changes afoot 2022 – with the recent global successes of the series Outlander and at Cumbernauld studios; filming Batman Glasgow; Brian Cox in Succession; and several other well known Scots actors. And with Sam Heughan portraying Jamie Frazer a proud and principled Highlander.  #¥esScots

 

  

Jamie Frazer and Claire