With his trilogy, "Culloden", "Glencoe" and "The Highland Clearances", John Prebble brought alive some of the central tragic episodes in Scottish history. memory itself, this book moves backwards and forwards between the distant and the recent past, between Prebble's recollections of the history he has written about and of his own life - emigration to Canada to build a new life on the prairies, fighting in World War II and being inspired by Scotland to begin a career as a writer.