Precipitous City: The story of Literary Edinburgh

by Trevor Royle

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210 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1980

About the author

Trevor Royle is a broadcaster and author specialising in the history of war and empire. He is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and was a member of the Scottish Government’s Advisory Panel for Commemorating the First World War.

Reviews

[James Henderson · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a literary biography of a city. Edinburgh has been the home to many poets, novelists, essayists, philosophers, scientists and other writers over its long history. Trevor Royle surveys this history highlighting the famous and not so famous writers who have made Edinburgh their home. In the eighteenth century there was Robert Burns. As the nineteenth century began Sir Walter Scott was the head of a "golden period" of writers that included among others James Hogg and Thomas Carlyle. By the second half of the nineteenth century my favorite Robert Louis Stevenson would take the mantle of leading author. At the end of the century James Barrie and Sir Arthur Conan Doyle could be counted among the writers who called Edinburgh home. Royle's survey is fascinating in bringing the literary gifts of this city to light.