Today's blog is a bit of a challenge... Next week, there is an exhibition in Thurso Art Gallery (it's the back room of the library, for any people in the area who are are interested in going along!) entitled Caithness Connections . I've had a little sneak peek on social media and been amazed by the variety of ideas the artists have used to consider the theme. It set me thinking about how differently people see their home, and how greatly it differs to how other people see it. Caithness is not a well-explored area, either in tourism (although this has improved since the NC500 route became popular) or in the arts, as its near neighbour Orkney. This is not always a bad thing - the Orkney which exists now is a far cry from the one I knew as home in my childhood thanks to the insane amount of cruise ship traffic, but when you say Caithness to most people from outwith Northern Scotland, most of them have no idea where it is if they've even heard of it. A few years ago, I wro...
I absolutely love this song! I don't know whether it is that I know more Tom Jones and Welsh songs which the Owain Glyndŵr song calls on, or whether it is just more my sort of music, or that - which I think is another consideration - this is about a historical figure who drifts into the realms of legend. At the moment, I am rereading my family saga and I came across this line: That man will be a legend until the day he dies, and an inspiration beyond. When I decided to write today's blog on Owain Glyndŵr, this quote fitted rather well. The man being discussed in the book was not a real figure from history but - after sharing more than 400,000 words with him during the course of my family saga - it certainly feels like I know him better than any of his real-life contemporaries! When I was researching Owain Glyndŵr for this blog, I was surprised to find just how long his reign lasted. I had assumed it was almost a flash-in-the-pan uprising, similar to those we had in Scotland se...