La Maladie de la Mort - I was pretty certain that my response to this show would prove shallow when more accomplished minds were turned to it. Sure enough what I dismissed as base metal Lyn Gardner deemed, if not pure gold then 19.2 carat.  Her successor at The Guardian, Kate Wyver was only slightly less enthusiastic. Flora Gosling however, in The Wee Review to which our own celebrated cmfwood contributes, came close to supporting my opinion, being just a tad too generous.

The English in Modern Scotland - Tom Devine, who must be every Scot's favourite historian, gave a sparkling talk at the Book Festival outlining what he argues in his contribution to New Scots, a book about immigrant communities here.  He reveals that from being a country of net emigration for centuries Scotland has in recent decades become a country of net immigration and that not surprisingly (perhaps?) most new Scots are English born.  They represent now (if I have remembered the figures correctly) a little under 10% of the population.  Contrary to some beliefs they are not all retirees buying up homes in the Hielands to the disadvantage of the locals but the vast majority are workers contributing significantly to economic growth.  He said that the university sector in particular owes a debt to them in achieving a position in which five of our universites are ranked in the top 200 out of a worldwide total of 26,000 institutions of higher education.