John Purser – författare

Archipelago is one of the most important and influential literary magazines of the lasttwenty years. Running to twelve editions, it was edited by Andrew McNeillie, with theassistance later of James McDonald Lockhart, and began as an attempt to reimagine therelationships between the islands of Ireland and Britain. Archipelago has brought togetherestablished and emerging artists in creative conversations that have transformed the studyof islands, coasts and waterways. It journeys from the Shetlands to Cornwall, from theAran Islands to the coast of Yorkshire, tracing the cultures of diverse zones through someof the best in contemporary writing about place and people.This collection gathers poetry, prose and visual art in clusters grouped around the Irishand British archipelago, with contributions from an array of significant artists. It includesnewly commissioned work as well as an interview between Andrew McNeillie andRobert Macfarlane on the development of Archipelago across the years.

A study of the life and works of Erik Chisholm, one of the most influential figures in twentieth-century Scottish music.Erik Chisholm was the pre-eminent composer and musician in Scottish classical music in the first half of the twentieth century. As Sir Charles Mackerras put it, 'Chisholm was a musician of rare capabilities. He was a pianist and organist, a conductor, a composer, a lecturer on music, an entrepreneur and administrator, and to all these he brought a unique blend of originality, flair and energy.' As well as his life in Glasgow, Chisholm travelled to the Far East, notably Singapore, for the Entertainments and National Service Association during the Second World War, and subsequently became Professor of Music at the University of Cape Town, where he greatly developed the study and performance of music. He conducted numerous first British performances, including Berlioz's The Trojans in 1935 and Bartok's Bluebeard's Castle in 1957. Accounts of the visits to Glasgow by such composers as Bartók,Casella, Hindemith et al are being presented here. Erik Chisholm. Scottish Modernist will be of general interest to scholars and students of twentieth-century music. In particular, those interested in the development of music, opera and ballet in Scotland, Scottish literature and cultural history will find this book of much value. It will also be of interest to those studying the music of Bartók, Sorabji, Hindemith, Walton, Bax, Casella, and Shostakovich whom Chisholm knew personally and brought to Scotland.

'Poetry was always a natural thing to me, part of letter-writing and simply another way of responding to the world'. Thus the author prefaces this substantial new collection of poems, in strict form and in free verse, including a number published previously - in 'The Counting Stick', 'A Share of the Wind', and 'Amoretti', all published by Aquila Press, or in anthologies and magazines - some of them 're-appearing' here with revisions. Informing this fresh view of his work are three of his father's 'Six Sea Poems'. The collection is introduced by Alan Riach, who describes 'the world John Purser makes for us in his poems, as in his music and his scholarship' as 'archipelagic, characterised by diversity and depths, bright sunlit perceptions and profundities of insight into the nature of the earth itself, and as far out as the music of the spheres permits us ...'.