Nan Shepherd: Naked and Unashamed review – the poetry, prose and passion of a Scottish modernist

Pitlochry Festival theatre
Richard Baron and Ellie Zeegen’s play follows the writer from wide-eyed child discovering nature in rural Scotland to feisty care-home resident

The title comes from a short story about two hikers on a camping trip. They decide to cast off their clothes and walk through the countryside as nature intended, only to be mistaken for poachers. The story’s combination of humour, transgression and ear for the Doric dialect of north-east Scotland were characteristic qualities of its author, Nan Shepherd (1893-1981), a writer unashamed by her nakedness and celebrated for her evocations of Scotland’s rural environment.

Celebrated, that is, once The Living Mountain, her short book about walking in the Cairngorms, was published. That was in 1977, three decades after its completion, but more especially in 2011 when it was republished by Canongate, just as it was slipping back into obscurity.

At Pitlochry Festival theatre until 14 June

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from The Guardian https://ift.tt/ryg4xZj