Waterstones Scottish Book of the Month for September is the new edition of Archie Hind's classic novel The Dear Green Place, published on the Polygon imprint of Birlinn Ltd. With Glasgow novels in the news in the last 12 months, in no small part due to the success of Yorgos Lanthimos' screen adaptation of Alasdair Gray's Poor Things, and Margaret McDonald's novel Glasgow Boys among the most talked about debuts, this is a timely publication. It includes an Introduction by the aforementioned Alasdair Gray, as well as Hind’s unfinished novel Fur Sadie and one of his essays ‘Men of the Clyde’, but The Dear Green Place is the main event - not just a great Glasgow novel, but one of the finest I have read. Below is an updated article on The Dear Green Place written for Indelible Ink.
There's more than a few Glasgow novels discussed on the pages of Indelible Ink; Alasdair Gray’s Lanark, Jeff Torrington’s Swing Hammer Swing and James Kelman’s Kieron Smith, boy being just three examples, but perhaps the most recognisable literary depictions of the city can be found in Archie Hind’s The Dear Green Place. Hind didn’t opt for the fantastical, surreal or unreliable as can be found in the above. His Glasgow is a more realistic and recognisable city, and as such what happens in the novel has a greater intensity and a profound impact on the reader.
It was Hind’s only novel published in his lifetime, but that’s perhaps not surprising once you’ve read the book. It has at its heart the difficulties that occur if your dreams are to live your life as an artist, and they are then placed against the need not only to feed yourself and family, but to fulfil the expectations of others. You get the feeling that Hinds poured his life onto these pages. This is a powerful novel with a story which will be recognisable to many.
The central character is Mat Craig, a young man who wants to be a writer, something his family cannot understand or accept. 1960s Glasgow plays an important role in the novel as its often bleak and unforgiving landscape seems to suppress Mat’s artistic leanings as much as the majority of people who live there. Both seem to be telling him, ‘know your place, and don’t get ideas above your station’. Becoming a writer, even suggesting it, is not macho enough for this city. The title of the novel becomes ironic, if not downright sarcastic.
Mat is pulled in different directions, not only by his family and friends, but by his own heart and head. Part of him feels it is his destiny and legacy to work with his brother, believing that blood, sweat and tears is the true nature of the working class, but he cannot shake the voice which says that he must pursue his dreams to be true to himself. Whichever route he chooses he will be betraying one or the other.
The Dear Green Place is perhaps closer in feel and subject matter to the kitchen sink dramas set mainly in the North of England than to other Scottish novels; films such as A Taste of Honey, Saturday Night, Sunday Morning and A Kind of Loving. They all share an urban realism and angst that avoids self pity or misplaced sympathy. What they reflect is lives where no decision comes without consequence when set against a background of poverty, and that the mythologized ‘swinging ‘60s’ were not as free and easy as some historical reflections would have you believe.
At the beginning of The Dear Green Place, there is a wonderful description of the River Clyde as it moves from the hills down through ‘Hamilton, Bothwell and Blantyre’ into Glasgow itself, following the twists and turns of the journey and detailing the history that occurred on and beside the river. It is a vivid description, one that I have often thought would make a great opening to a film or TV adaptation, and Hind’s marvellous descriptions of people and place make me wonder why his novel has never been dramatised on screen (if it has, do let me know!).
The questions which The Dear Green Place poses are as relevant today as they have been at any time in the recent past. The idea of making a living from writing, or any other art form, is, for most people, as unrealistic as ever. The vast majority of writers Scots Whay Hae! has written about, reviewed, and spoken to, had to have, or continue to have, other ways of surviving. Perhaps that is inevitable, but The Dear Green Place reminds us that most people who follow a life in any of the arts are bound for a struggle, but how much would our lives be lessened if they did not do so. These books we read are not just hobbies, they are people’s lives, and we would understand our own much less without them. Same as it ever was.
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