ScotlandsFest: Collier Laddie - Rab Wilson

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Close a pit, kill a community. Forty years on, Scots poet Rab Wilson relives the events of the 1984-85 UK Miners' Strike.

About ScotlandsFest: Collier Laddie - Rab Wilson

Listed Under Arts and Crafts Events / History Events / Talks and Lectures Events

His powerful poems seethe with rage, anger, passion and pity, a testament to the working-class struggle. Having toiled in Scotland’s mining industry for eight years, Rab emerges as an essential chronicler of a culture and way of life destroyed by Thatcherism.

Forty years on from the 1984–85 uk Miners’ Strike, the largest union-led industrial action in the 20th century, Rab Wilson – a former miner deeply entrenched in the strike – delivers a powerful narrative through his mining poems and strike diary, addressing contemporary social and economic issues in Scotland and the uk then and now.

Having toiled in Scotland’s mining industry for eight years, Rab provides an authentic voice that resonates with the struggles faced during the strike, vividly captured from his involvement between 12 March 1984 and 5 March 1985. This book serves as a testament to the working-class struggle, offering a unique perspective on the historical significance of Scotland’s mining industry, skillfully expressed by a poet intimately connected to it. Rab Wilson emerges as an essential chronicler, ensuring the legacy of the miners’ challenging strike endures in the pages of this evocative and timely work.

Collier Laddie is an ode to resilience, solidarity and the enduring legacy of those who fought for justice during a pivotal moment in industrial history.

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