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Whaar'll I in Voar dwell? Whaar'll I in Simmer fare? Whaar'll I in Hairst shair? FOREWORD BY THE AUTHOR This novel is based on the Weisdale evictions but does not pretend to give an accurate historical account of these events. While attempting to follow as close as possible the general pattern of what happened, its main purpose is to convey an impression of life in rural Shetland about the middle of the last century and the shattering effect on one community of a policy of clearances. The removal of almost two hundred people from Upper Weisdale took as long as twenty years to accomplish but that in itself became imprinted in folk memory as a bitter and dramatic blow. To convey something of the force of that blow the events of this story have been compressed into little over a single year. The characters are fictitious but it would have been perverse to have given other names to such prominent contemporary figures as D. D. Black, Rev. John Turnbull, John Scott, Charles Ogilvy and Charles Duncan. Even so, history has left such sketchy pictures of these personalities that they appear as products of the imagination. A Glossary of Shetland Words appears at the end.
John J. Graham
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