Neil M. Gunn

Neil Gunn has long been recognized in Scotland as one of the well-springs of the literary renaissance of the nineteen-twenties and nineteen-thirties and is now generally accepted as the most significant novelist the Highlands of Scotland has produced. Yet his work has divided the critics: one view sees him as essentially a regional writer recreating the history of the Highlands and exploring the values of a traditional society. Another sees his greatest contribution in the later novels which deal with the deepest issues of the day in more exploratory and experimental fashion. This study demonstrates that in fact Gunn accepts no limitations in psychological and philosophical penetration, and deals always with the whole universe of man and the other landscape of the mind. The varied criticism of Gunn and the reasons for his neglect outside Scotland are sharply examined, and his status as a novelist of European stature is assessed.