Assoc for Scottish LiteratureApr 2, 2024

George MacDonald Fraser (1925–2008) – author, historian, journalist, screenwriter – was born #OTD, 2 April, 1925

“His dedication to strongly researched stories, built firmly on a bedrock of historical fact, but always with an eye to the humour of a situation, was the core of what appealed to me”

Historical novelist Michael Jecks discusses George MacDonald Fraser’s writing for the Royal Literary Fund:

https://www.rlf.org.uk/showcase/not-a-serious-writer/

@bookstodon

#Scottish #literature #historicalfiction
1/5

Not A Serious Writer

Harry Flashman is a fictional character borrowed from a novel who purports to be telling the truth about real, historical events – an illusion supported by George MacDonald Fraser’s well-researched footnotes. Michael Jecks locates the realism at the heart of a series of historical novels masquerading as thrillers.

The Royal Literary Fund
Show threadAssoc for Scottish LiteratureApr 2, 2024

“QUARTERED SAFE OUT HERE … provides insight into what it takes an individual to survive, both (with luck) physically and, more importantly, ethically”

– retired Australian Army officer Jason Thomas on George MacDonald Fraser’s memoir of the #WW2 Burma campaign

https://warroom.armywarcollege.edu/special-series/dusty-shelves/quartered-safe/

#Scottish #literature #history #memoir #war

2/5

ON GOOD PENMANSHIP: QUARTERED SAFE OUT HERE (DUSTY SHELVES)

It's been a while but the DUSTY SHELVES series is back with a new look at an older book. WAR ROOM welcomes Jason Thomas as he reviews Quartered Safe Out Here by George MacDonald Fraser. An intriguing look at the oft forgotten China Burma India Theater of World War II, MacDonald Fraser is a skilled author that relays the experiences of the men of The Border Regiment through his personal history as an infantryman in the Burma Campaign. Jason pulls out the book's lessons of unit cohesion, integrity, ethics and resilience that are timeless and useful to any military leader and deems Quartered Safe Out Here worthy of a dust off.

War Room - U.S. Army War College
Show threadAssoc for Scottish Literature

“At one moment when President Richard Nixon was taking part in his inauguration ceremony, he appeared flanked by Lyndon Johnson and Billy Graham […] it was one of those historical coincidences which send a little shudder through the mind…”

– George MacDonald Fraser, THE STEEL BONNETS (1971)

#Scottish #literature #history #Borders #reivers

3/5

Apr 2, 2024 at 11:17amWeb
Show threadAssoc for Scottish LiteratureApr 2, 2024

“There is a story they tell in Breadalbane:
Gordon of Achruach was at feud with Campbell of Kentallan, who hired certain Gregora, landless men, who took the Gordon unawares while he was hunting in the Mamore. And they cut off his head and put it in a bag to show the Campbell that the work was done. That was the way of it…”

– From “The Gordon Women”, by George MacDonald Fraser. Published in THE SHEIKH AND THE DUSTBIN (1988)

#Scottish #literature #history #folklore #clans

4/5

Show threadAssoc for Scottish LiteratureApr 2, 2024

George MacDonald Fraser on Desert Island Discs in 2001 – available to listen to on BBC Sounds

#Scottish #literature #20thCentury

5/5

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p009498m

BBC Radio 4 - Desert Island Discs, George MacDonald Fraser

Sue Lawley's castaway is writer George MacDonald Fraser

BBC
Show threadEstarriol, Terrorist DragonApr 2, 2024
@scotlit Oddly, I like Quarterd Safe, and the Complete McAuslan books and Pyrates, but I detested Flashman with a venom.
Show threadAssoc for Scottish LiteratureApr 2, 2024
@Thebratdragon Flashman can be difficult, I agree. He is such an awful character, on any level: his only redeeming feature is his complete honesty (albeit only in his secret memoirs). In many respects he is an embodiment of the British Empire: a magnificent outward show concealing something greedy, lecherous, & utterly self-centred, lurching from crisis to crisis & prepared to do absolutely anything to save his own skin. There is at least some schadenfreude to be had in watching him suffer…