Stone Voices: The Search for Scotland

Scotland has a new Parliament and it has North Sea oil, but is it yet an independent, self-sustaining democracy? Is it a true nation? In Stone Voices, Neal Ascherson launches what he calls an imaginative invasion of his native land, searching for the relationships, themes, and fantasies that make up "Scotland."

Beginning with a breathtaking portrait of the countryÆs landscape, and of the way humanity has indelibly marked even its rockiest contours, Ascherson takes us on a journey through ScotlandÆs past, interweaving his historical accounts with a rollicking report on a back-country bus expedition he joined during the 1997 referendum campaign that led to ScotlandÆs first modern Parliament. He asked voters then what kind of country they hoped for, what they feared, and what they expectedùquestions that animate his book as well.

In his search for a nation, Acherson explores many themes: the slow, hybrid formation of the Scottish people over centuries of successive immigrations; the way their most renowned intellectuals and writers came to hate the national church; the peculiar nature of their diaspora; the coexistence of their search for an ôauthenticö Scotland with the myths others create; and the ScotsÆ proud sense of true independence. Stone Voices enlightens us about Scotland, about Europe, and about the conditions for freedom that we must all seek today.