Glasgow: The Autobiography

by Alan Taylor (Editor)

The Autobiography tells the story of the fabled, former Second City of the British Empire from its origins as a bucolic village on the rivers Kelvin and Clyde, through the tumult of the Industrial Revolution to the third millennium.

Including extracts from an astonishing array of contributors from Daniel Defoe, Dorothy Wordsworth and Dr Johnson to Evelyn Waugh and Dirk Bogarde, it also features the writing of bred-in-thebone Glaswegians such as Alasdair Gray, Liz Lochhead, James Kelman and 2020 Booker prize-winner Douglas Stuart. The result is a varied and vivid portrait of one of the world's great cities in all its grime and glory – a place which is at once infuriating, inspiring, raucous, humourful and never, ever dull.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Scotland

394 pages, Kindle Edition

Published September 1, 2016

About the author

Alan Taylor is a journalist and founder of The Scottish Review of Books. he is a regular contributor to a variety of publications and in an earlier incarnation was a reference librarian.

Reviews

[Sarah]

It is kind of like the history of Glasgow through twitter feeds of verified accounts. The excerpts are taken straight from authentic Glaswegian writings. I couldn't finish it only because I am the sort to sit down and go through a whole book when this gave me an excuse to stop every couple pages. I might pick it up again.

[Richard Sisson]

This book was a collection of memories and experiences of Glasgow drawn primarily from memoirs, but also occasionally from official documents, newspaper articles, poems and even novels, from the 1590s to 2020. Each piece was preceded by a short introduction providing context either about the author or the period or subject of the writing. It was quite a different approach. Perhaps best described as a series of socio-cultural insights into Glasgow over time. However, interesting though it was, I learned very little about the history of Glasgow and nothing about its early development. It would have benefitted from an brief historical introduction to each section.

[Kenny]

It’s half autobiography and half biography, I’d say, given how many contributions are from visitors rather than residents. But on the whole it’s a decent read. It felt like it focused quite a bit on the 80s at the expense of 2000 onward, and there’s a few pieces I wondered why they were in at all, but I guess that’s the nature of the beast.

[Neveah]

I limped through this, but a huge amount of people seem to recollect Glasgow as either ‘not as good as Edinburgh’, or ‘really wet’. Neither are particularly true! There’s some good local history but overall the collection is a bit too lumpy for me.

[Daniel Watkins]

I quite enjoyed this. The views of the city from many perspectives work into a mosaic across time and class. A few of the pieces end too soon, some never go anywhere, and others are wonderful. Definitely want to find the full text for some of these stories.

[Rix]

As ever with a book compiled of other pieces of writing, bits of this were more engaging than others. Overall it was a fun read through Things That Happen In Glasgow

[Sheila Che]

3.5

[Anne Gibbons-Ellis]

quick tour of glasgow,s history

a good read. very interesting. some anecdotes were too short i wanted more. would recommend to anyone,especially anyone from glasgow.