Seeing the Big Picture

PETER URPETH wrote on the work of the late Torquil Macrath for an early issue of Northings in 2003

THE SUDDEN DEATH of Torcuil Macrath, at the age of 82, robs the Gaelic language and culture not only of one of its most learned and original writers but also of one of its most forthright advocates.

Torcuil was a writer who saw the big picture of cultural change and the threats to the culture and language he loved, but his was no parochial interjection, his work drew on literatures and cultures from around the globe whilst at the same time drawing on the well of history of his own culture.

His mind was open and enquiring, and he had little time for pretension, vanity or any of the other manifestations of superficiality. At the same time he was great company, good craic, informative, sharing, often challenging and contentious.

He had little formal education but was learned in the most valuable sense of that word, possessing education from his own experience of life, the culture, people and community around him, the books he loved and from his engagement with the natural world.

© Peter Urpeth, 2006