‘Trailblazer’ author and painter Alasdair Gray, dies, aged 85
SCOTS artist and author Alasdair Gray, the ‘cultural trailblazer’ famous for his classic novel Lanark, has died, aged 85.
Gray wrote more than 30 books, all of which he designed and illustrated, and created several murals in his native Glasgow.
His work is also on display in galleries ranging from the V&A to the Scottish National Gallery of Modern Art.
The polymath died yesterday at Queen Elizabeth University Hospital in Glasgow after a short illness, his publisher Canongate announced.
In a statement shared by Canongate, his family said: ‘Early this morning we lost a deeply loved member of our family. Alasdair was an extraordinary person; very talented and, even more importantly, very humane.
‘He was unique and irreplaceable and we will miss him greatly.’
His family said that ‘in keeping with his principles, Alasdair wanted his body donated to medical science, so there will be no funeral’.
Gray’s work included novels, short story collections, plays, volumes of poetry, works of non-fiction and translations – most recently, his interpretation of Dante’s Divine Trilogy into English.
His murals can be seen in venues including the ceiling of the Auditorium at the Oran Mor venue, and The Ubiquitous Chip restaurant, both in Glasgow, as well as at the city’s Hillhead underground station.
First Minister Nicola Sturgeon was among those to pay tribute to Gray yesterday.
In a tweet, she said: ‘Such sad news. Alasdair Gray was one of Scotland’s literary giants and a decent, principled human being.
‘He’ll be remembered best for the masterpiece that is Lanark, but everything he wrote reflected his brilliance. Today, we mourn the loss of a genius and think of his family.’ The writer’s agent, Jenny Brown, said: ‘He was a cultural trailblazer: nobody has done more to spur on, and give confidence to, the next generation of Scottish writers.’
Gray was a supporter of Scottish independence, penning Independence: How We Should Rule Ourselves, which was published in June 2014 as Scotland geared up for the referendum,
He also decorated the front page of the Sunday Herald the day it declared it was backing a Yes vote in May that year.
He designed former SNP leader Alex Salmond’s official 2011 Christmas card, which depicted a wide-eyed woman – Bella Caledonia – holding a large thistle and wearing a Glengarry hat with a tartan plaid over her left shoulder.
In 2012, he caused controversy by describing English people who are appointed to Scotland’s top arts jobs as ‘colonists and settlers’ who only move north of the Border to further their careers before returning south.
Born on December 28, 1934, in the Riddrie area of Glasgow, to Alexander and Amy, Gray was evacuated to a farm in Auchterarder, Perthshire, during the Second World War, along with his mother and younger sister, and then to Stonehouse, Lanarkshire.
From 1942 to 1945 the family lived in Yorkshire, where his father was working, before they returned to Glasgow where the young Gray attended Whitehill Secondary School, receiving prizes for art and English.
He attended Glasgow School of Art from 1952-57, studying design and mural painting, and went on to make his living from writing, painting and teaching.
It was in the 1950s that he began writing what would become the novel Lanark, which was published in 1981 to great critical acclaim. It won a Scottish Arts Council book award and the Scottish Book of the Year award.
Hailed as a modern classic and mixing fantasy, autobiography and social realism, it tells the interwoven stories of Lanark and Duncan Thaw, and is set in the cities of Glasgow and Unthank.
He went on to write many more books, several of which he illustrated. His other works of fiction include 1982, Janine (1984), Something Leather (1990) and Poor Things (1992), which won the Whitbread Novel Award and the Guardian Fiction Prize.
He was also editor of The Book Of Prefaces, published in 2000, and wrote short stories, poems and plays for radio, television and theatre.
Over the years, he also made his name as a painter, creating work closely intertwined with the city which was his home.
He worked as a theatrical scene painter for the Glasgow Pavilion and Citizens theatres in 1962-63.
During the course of his career, Gray was also involved in teaching and academia, working as an art teacher, mostly part-time, in Glasgow and Lanarkshire between 1958 and 1962.
He was writer in residence at Glasgow University from 1977 to 1979 and held the chair of creative writing jointly with Tom Leonard and James Kelman at the institution from 2001 to 2003.
In 1961, he married Danish nurse Inge Sorenson, with whom he had a son Andrew, born in 1963. Their marriage ended in 1969.
His second marriage came in 1991 when he wed Morag McAlpine, who died in 2014.
His autobiography, Of Me & Others, was published in 2014.
‘One of Scotland’s literary giants’