The Furrow Behind Me: the Autobiography of a Hebridean Crofter

Angus MacLellan was regarded throughout his own lifetime as one of Scotland's finest traditional Gaelic storytellers. Reminiscences of his life were first recorded - on tape in Gaelic - in the early years of the 1960s and later transcribed and translated by John Lorne Campbell into this English-language biography. Born in 1869 into a poverty-stricken crofting community on South Uist, Angus MacLellan spent his childhood and his youth with his family before travelling from the island to find work first in the militia and then on the farms of the mainland. His travels came to an end when he returned to assist and eventually to succeed, his parents on their croft on South Uist in 1896. Angus MacLellan's memory for detail and his gift for telling should bring to the reader a vivid picture of a harsh lifestyle encompassing two centuries of dramatic change. The companion volume, Stories from South Uist by Angus MacLellan, is also available from Birlinn Ltd.

Born in 1869, Angus MacLellan's life encompassed two centuries and great changes in the Scottish way of life, from rural to industrial, from island to mainland. He left Uist to go into camp with the militia, before working for farmers on the mainland in Perthshire and Argyll. He later returned to the family croft on South Uist to work at inshore fishing and crafting.