A long time ago, a somewhat intimidating and acerbic wit suggested that I read The Private Memoirs and Confessions of a Justified Sinner by James Hogg. It is the story of pious young Robert Wringhim who believes that he is one of the Just, that is, one of the select group of people, according to Calvinist predestination doctrine, who will ascend to heaven regardless of anything. His religious fanaticism mixed with the heady power of his predestination empowers him to ignore that pesky moral code in favor of delivering righteousness to those who have it coming to them. Darkly funny and strangely powerful, Hogg's novel was a formative reading experience for me.

This leads me to two current authors, both Scottish.

The first is James Robertson. His novel The Testament of Gideon Mack certainly sparked memories of Hogg's novel when I read it. It is similarly structured with the text being "discovered" and then presented by an editor. The story of a minister and apparent suicide, it reveals a curious and twisting narrative that takes him from his cold and strict upbringing at the firm hand of his minister father through his own self-inflicted obedience. Gideon Mack diverges from Hogg's Robert Wringhim in his absolute and avowed atheism. This, despite his dedication as a Presbyterian minister to his small parish on the bleak Scottish coast. This atheism is challenged not by some powerful affirmation, but by the devil himself whom he meets after a freak accident that should have left him for dead.

This is Robertson's first publication in the US and couldn't be more Scottish with its barren, rocky village, its dreary weather, and its solemn and terse narrator. The Testament of Gideon Mack is an engaging meditation on faith and its place in the modern world.

Irvine Welsh has noted that James Hogg was an influential writer for him. And it just so happens we're hosting a reading with Mr. Welsh at 7pm on May 10th at the Wonderland Ballroom in the Columbia Heights neighborhood of DC.

And furthermore, to round out this Scottish bonanza. I finally saw The Last King of Scotland last Friday.