Morvern: A Highland Parish

There must be very few corners left in the British Isles against whose picturesque and historical background so many dramas and epic tales have been played, but yet which so little has been documented. Such a place is Morvern – a roughly triangular-shaped peninsula lying west of Fort William and at the foot of the Great Glen. Immortalised by James MacPherson (as the home of Ossian, the Heroic Fingalian warrior), Tennyson and Scott, it is now a remote and little known part of what was Argyll lost in the anonymity of the Highland region.

Morvern: A Highland Parish (first published as Reminiscences of a Highland Parish) was so popular from its first appearance in 1867 that it went through many editions. The value of Norman Macleod’s book today lies in its encapsulation of the past, its humour, its evocation of the scenery of Morvern and surroundings, and its specific appreciation of the remarkable natural intelligence and concern for humanity. It speaks of Morvern, but describes a whole breed of West Highlanders. Even more importantly it clarifies the Highlander’s own view of the Clan, a very necessary exercise at a time when notions of what a Clan is are romantically distanced from reality.