ABSTRACT
David Lowenthal’s observation that ‘the locus of memory lies more readily in place than in time’ (1997: 180) is certainly borne out when considering the relationship between landscape and memory in the Scottish Highlands. Neil Gunn, for example, provides a wonderful account of storytelling through the Caithness landscape in his 1942 novel, Young Art and Old Hector. Towards the end of this fable, the avuncular Old Hector takes his young friend, Art, to ‘the River’, the magical ‘far country’ up the strath that Art has heard so much about, but to which he has not yet dared venture. Art’s elder brother has recently emigrated and Art wonders why Hector did not want to leave the village and ‘go away off into the world’ like so many others.
