A panoramic life

John Buchan (1875– 1940) was born in Perth, the son of a Free Church minister in the Glasgow Gorbals. He won a scholarship to Brasenose College, Oxford, married into the aristocracy (Susan Grosvenor, in 1907) and became an MP in 1927. He made speeches on conservation in parliament and successfully introduced a bill outlawing the caging of wild birds. At the time of his death, by then 1st Baron Lord Tweedsmuir, he was Governor-general of Canada.

His output as a man of letters was staggering, not least because, despite a love of outdoor activities such as climbing and fishing, his health was not robust. A collection of his superb shorter Scottish fiction was brought together in The Watcher By The Threshold, mostly set in his beloved Border country. Buchan’s highly recommended historical fiction includes Midwinter and Witch Wood. Outstanding among his other thrillers are Greenmantle (which outsold The Thirty-nine Steps), Mr Standfast and John Macnab.