In my book 'The Winter Sea,' set north of Aberdeen, I couldn't just ignore the fact some people there - especially the people in the past - would speak the Doric.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
When you hear someone from the very north of Scotland speaking, I think its nice, very musical and harmonious.
On the other hand, if there's an underlying core of poetry that I go to, I go to the sea. I've lived on the sea all my life. I live on the sea in Cape Breton.
The Scottish Highlands are incredible. There seems to be magic and poetry everywhere.
I love the drive from York to Whitby over the moors - one of the great journeys, in my book.
I grew up sailing in the North Sea.
Apparently when I went to school, I had a Glasgow accent.
When I look back at my childhood on the Ayrshire coast, I recall a basic devotion to the idea that human nature and national character are as unknowable as the weather's rationale.
There's a lot of fantasy about what Scotland is, and the shortbread tins and that sort of thing.
There is something so quiet and so industrious, something so Viking about the Scots.
I am now in Gibraltar. It is a large place and there does not seem to be room in this letter, in which to express my feelings about Moors in bare legs and six thousand Red-coats and to hear Englishmen speak again.