Sunset Song (Canons)

Review "Sunset Song's great gripping hybrid of melodrama and realism . . . left me scorched" -- ALI SMITH "If this new edition is prompting you to re-read Sunset Song after many years, as I have just done, you will find it has lost none of its appeal and emotion. And if you are about to read this remarkable novel for the first time, you are embarking on a profound journey" -- NICOLA STURGEON "Portrayed with a lyrical intensity that echoes through the years and still resonates today" ― New York Times "An unforgettable evocation of a way of life that has slipped away . . . It is a love song for a landscape and language still familiar - and precious - to a generation born long after [Grassic-Gibbon] died . . . Chris is one of the great women of 20th-century fiction" ― Guardian "Chris Guthrie is the most passionate and appealing heroine in Scottish literature; Grassic Gibbon's magnificent novel is fresh, powerful and timeless" -- ANNE DONOVAN "It is gritty and passionate and one of Scotland's great 20th-century novels" ― Daily Express "When I read Lewis Grassic Gibbon's Sunset Song in my mid-teens I entered into it with such wholehearted love that I longed to live inside it . . . The rhythms of the prose are incantatory, musical . . . Chris is the centre of the novel and its genius, vivid on every page where she's present" -- TESSA HADLEY ― Guardian "An inescapable landmark of Scottish literature . . . Few novels have ever achieved such an unaffectedly sublime blend of poetry and music, and it is clear from the outset that the title is anything but a conceit. The prose is increasingly symphonic, in its sweep and surge, but the final effect is more like what bagpipers call ceol mor, "big music". It is full of haunting echoes of traditional Scottish balladry" ― Times Literary Supplement "His three great novels have the impetus and music of mountain burns in full spate" ― Observer "An evocative look at female life on the Scottish frontier . . . Sunset Song is the story of a resilient young woman during the early 20th century. Her profound identification with the land is her source of renewal and strength as she endures harrowing family circumstances and, eventually, the devastating fallout of the First World War" ― Los Angeles Times Product Description Twice Voted Scotland's Favourite Book 'Left me scorched' Ali Smith 'Unforgettable' Guardian Faced with a choice between a harsh farming life and the world of books and learning, Chris Guthrie chooses to remain in her rural community, bound by her intense love of the land. But everything changes with the arrival of the First World War and Chris finds her land altered beyond recognition. One of the greatest and most heartbreaking love stories ever told,, Sunset Song offers a powerful portrait of a land and people in turmoil. Book Description The Scottish masterpiece - introduced by First Minister Nicola Sturgeon About the Author James Leslie Mitchell, 'Lewis Grassic Gibbon' (1901-35), was born and brought up in the rich farming land of Scotland's North-East coast. After a brief journalistic career, he joined the Royal Army Service Corps in 1919, serving in Persia, India and Egypt before he spent six years as a clerk in the RAF. He married Rebecca Middleton in 1925, and became a full-time writer in 1929. He was a prolific writer of novels, short stories and essays and had seventeen full length books published before his untimely death at the age of thirty-four. He adopted his maternal grandmother's name for his Scottish work including A Scots Quair: Sunset Song, Cloud Howe and Grey Granite. An unfinished novel, The Speak of the Mearns, was published posthumously in 1982.