Home > Uniquely Unspoilt Magazine> Issue 5 > Literary places
Scottish literary places
From Tam O?Shanter to Treasure Island, if you?ve ever wondered where Scotland?s greatest authors got their inspiration, there are several places where you can see exactly where they lived, wrote and the surroundings that fired their imaginations.
Scotland?s national poet Robert Burns is the most famous of them all, and there are plenty of chances to visit his former haunts.
Ellisland Farm, north of Dumfries, is open to visitors and was the poet?s home for three years. It has plenty of memorabilia such as his mirror, fishing rod and even original manuscripts on display. The house feels really atmospheric, and the nearby walk along the River Nith is said to be where Burns wrote Tam O? Shanter. The spooky Auld Kirk at Alloway near Ayr is where Tam saw the witches dance and definitely feels haunted.
While Burns is thought of as one of poetry?s greats, Scotland also has the dubious honour of producing the world?s worst poet, William Topaz McGonagall. Dundee is his home town, and there you can see the plaque in Paton's Lane, where he lived for most of his life. His most famous poem is The Tay Bridge Disaster, and the first verse has been etched into the pavement running along the north bank of the river.
Abbotsford near Melrose on the banks of the River Tweed is the former home of Rob Roy author Sir Walter Scott and is still lived in by his descendants today. Nowhere else in Scotland really contains so much of a writer?s life and work in one place. Rob Roy?s gun is on display, as are the library and study, which house a collection of 9000 rare books, and have hardly changed since Scott?s lifetime.
Scott was also a friend of Confessions of a Justified Sinner author James Hogg, and the two often used to meet at the Tibbie Shiels Inn on the shores of the beautiful St Marys Loch. Surrounded by hills, the pub is an excellent starting point for walking (it?s on the Southern Upland Way long distance footpath) or fishing. You can even visit the statue to Hogg overlooking the loch.
Going much further afield, Robert Louis Stevenson was inspired to write two of his greatest novels by some of Scotland?s most stunning but windswept scenery. Treasure Island is loosely based on Unst (Scotland?s most northerly inhabited island) in Shetland and Kidnapped is set on Erraid off the Mull coast where he lived for a while.
As for recent Scottish literature, there have been plenty of new acclaimed novels in recent years, although in many cases locations written about by the likes of Irvine Welsh and Ian Rankin are perhaps best visited only in the imagination.
This article was originally "printed" in the September 2003 issue of Uniquely Unspoilt, a free monthly e-magazine for those with an interest in rural Scotland.
Cottages relevant to this article
The following holiday cottages are situated within easy reach of the locations mentioned above:
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