Alasdair Gray – writer and artist extraordinaire –
embodying and celebrating both the city of Glasgow and the very soul of
originality – has died,
suddenly, just one day after celebrating his 85th birthday.
I had been delighted to find earlier this year a copy
of his A
Life in Pictures in which he weaves his autobiographical text together with
his sketches, portraits, landscapes and book designs. He was indeed sometimes
compared to William Blake – since so few manage to combine both visual and
verbal genius.
That soon had me thinking about the different types of
intelligence we have – I hadn’t realized that Howard
Gardiner had suggested we actually have nine! Perhaps that’ why I woke
today with a dream about how conferences reward only those who like to perform -
and leave the shy and taciturn frustrated
Alasdair Gray’s approach to books and their design
showed his creativity at full stretch. He designed every stage of the process,
it seems, except for actually printing the book itself
Paris Review is a prestigious journal devoted to writing and, rightly, had
separate features on him – first as a
writer and then as a
visual artist
Prospect magazine paid a lovely
final tribute to him this week – having
interviewed him earlier this year
A Gray Resource
https://www.dalkeyarchive.com/a-conversation-with-alasdair-gray-by-mark-axelrod/
A
life in Pictures – a superb illustrated autobiography which contains hundreds
of portraits of his friends as well as landscapes and book designs
http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/6450/1/6450_3750.PDF
a thesis on the literature of Alasdair Gray
Lanark – a life in
four books; A Gray (1981) His most famous novel – set alternately in
contemporary Glasgow then in a dystopian one
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