Five Glasgow Stories

Five Glasgow Stories
published by Red Squirrel Press / Postbox Press

I was born and brought up in Glasgow, so when I read that the prestigious independent publisher Red Squirrel Press planned to publish a collection of short stories set in or inspired by the city, of course I aspired to be in it. What to write, though? Red Squirrel, and their literary fiction imprint Postbox Press, have meticulously high standards. I did have a story draft which I hoped might fit, but doubts crept in. This opportunity was important to me. How could I make the story the best fit possible?

One of my first successes with short fiction was way back in November 2002, when my story Unrestricted reached the final six of the Macallan/Scotland on Sunday Short Story Competition. While it didn't go on to win this highly-regarded award with its generous £6,000 prize, it did win me some kudos, and a cheque for £500 presented during attendance at a glamorous awards night in The Tun in Edinburgh. In his introduction to the volume Shorts 5, published that same year by Polygon, editor and very fine writer Suhayl Saadi described Unrestricted as 'A story told at its very best'. It was a story written in an urban Scots dialect - a Glasgow dialect. Should I do the same now?

Mist rising from the River Clyde

Hours from the deadline, I set off walking round my local area, considering this and any other edits I could do to make my short story a real contender. I reached the decision. Yes, I would switch it from standard English entirely into Glasgow dialect. By 'entirely' I mean there would be no confining the dialect to characters' speech in inverted commas, as if held up by some narrator who speaks 'proper' English. Thank you, James Kelman, for opening my eyes to this class division - and to the woman I had a heated discussion with on a translation forum many years ago, who insisted dialect is slang and has no place in literature. I disagreed profoundly. Dialect is someone's mother tongue, and no mother tongue is any better than any other when it comes to expressing what it is to be human. My favourite quote of all time is 'a shprakh iz a dialekt mit an armey un flot'. Attributed to Max Weinreich, this translates roughly as 'A language is (just) a dialect that has an army and a navy'.

And so, in a bit of a rush before the 5pm deadline, I translated my story Look Up into my own dialect and pressed 'send'. I was delighted to receive the news that it was accepted for publication along with four superb short stories by authors Christine Appleyard, Colette Coen, Charlie Gracie and Donal McLaughlin. Each brings their own unique perspective on the city, and each story is filled with heart like the city itself. 

Five Glasgow Stories was launched in Spring 2023 at a venue in the heart of the old city, along with issue 8 of Postbox Magazine, and both are available to buy direct from the publisher. Events and life in general have overtaken me in the last few months but I'm pleased to finally be able to celebrate publication through this blog post, and to express my thanks to Red Squirrel Press publisher Sheila Wakefield and to Colin Will, editor of Postbox Press.