A while back I introduced you to the real-life model for Dr Jeykll, now I'm going to tell you about another literary character based on a real person. That literary character is Ebeneezer Scrooge and his mere existence is an insult to the man whose tombstone Charles Dickens misread.

Ebeneezer Scroggie was a successful merchant, vintner and Town Councillor (or Baillie) in Edinburgh. He held the first contract to supply whisky to the Royal Navy in Leith and was also responsible...

“Robinson Crusoe” was written by Daniel Defoe in or around 1719 (at the time he was employed as a Hanoverian spy in Edinburgh). The original title of the book was “The Life and Strange Surprizing Adventures of Robinson Crusoe, of York, Mariner: Who lived Eight and Twenty Years, all alone in an uninhabited Island on the Coast of America, near the Mouth of the Great River of Oroonoque; Having been cast on Shore by Shipwreck, wherein all the Men perished but himself. With An Account how he was at last...

Mac Bethad mac Findlaích (MacBheatha mac Fhionnlaigh in modern Gaelic) or MacBeth in English, was, contrary to a popular work by William Shakespeare, one of the better Kings of Scots. His reign lasted 17 years (a notable thing in a time when kings were lucky to last anything over 5 years).


MacBeth gained the throne when King Duncan I died in battle (against MacBeth) – incidentally, King Duncan wasn't the old fogey described in the play, nor was he murdered in his sleep. It...

Scotland in the late 13th century was in the midst of what is somewhat idiotically known as a “Golden Age”. As with the Romans, the successful Norman invasion of England petered out at the border. Or so says the accepted version of history. The Norman incursions into Scotland were originally at the invitation of Mac Bethad Mac Fionnlaigh (yes, that MacBeth) in the 1050's when certain Norman families living in England fell foul of Edward the Confessor. MacBeth gave them sanctuary and lands...

Listen. Not with your ears Listen from your heart
Seeing, use not your eyes,
Look from your soul
Love not with your heart
Love with your soul
Touch with yourself
Not with your hand
Taste with your soul
Not with your tongue
Believe with your being
And love with your all.