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30 November is St Andrew’s Day, but who was St Andrew? The apostle and patron saint of Scotland, Andrew was a fisherman from Capernaum in Galilee. He is rather a mysterious figure, and you can read more about him in the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. St Andrew’s Day is well-established and widely celebrated by Scots around the world. To mark the occasion, we have selected quotations from some of Scotland’s most treasured wordsmiths, using the bestselling Oxford Dictionary of Quotations and the Little Oxford Dictionary of Quotations.

There are few more impressive sights in the world than a Scotsman on the make.
J. M. Barrie 1860-1937 Scottish writer

From the lone shielding of the misty island
Mountains divide us, and the waste of seas –
Yet still the blood is strong, the heart is Highland,
And we in dreams behold the Hebrides!
John Galt 1779-1839 Scottish writer

O Caledonia! Stern and wild,
Meet nurse for a poetic child!
Sir Walter Scott 1771-1832 Scottish novelist

O flower of Scotland, when will we see your like again,
that fought and died for your wee bit hill and glen
and stood against him, proud Edward’s army,
and sent him homeward tae think again.
Roy Williamson 1936-90 Scottish folksinger and musician

I love a lassie, a bonnie, bonnie lassie,
She’s as pure as the lily in the dell.
She’s as sweet as the heather, the bonnie bloomin’ heather –
Mary, ma Scotch Bluebell.
Harry Lauder 1870-1950 Scottish music-hall entertainer

My poems should be Clyde-built, crude and sure,
With images of those dole-deployed
To honour the indomitable Reds,
Clydesiders of slant steel and angled cranes;
A poetry of nuts and bolts, born, bred,
Embattled by the Clyde, tight and impure.
Douglas Dunn 1942– Scottish poet

Who owns this landscape?
The millionaire who bought it or
the poacher staggering downhill in the early morning
with a deer on his back?
Norman McCaig 1910–96 Scottish poet

The Little Oxford Dictionary of Quotations fifth edition was published in October this year and is edited by Susan Ratcliffe. The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations seventh edition was published in 2009 to celebrate its 70^th year. The ODQ is edited by Elizabeth Knowles.

The Oxford DNB online has made the above-linked lives free to access for a limited time. The ODNB is freely available via public libraries across the UK. Libraries offer ‘remote access’ allowing members to log-on to the complete dictionary, for free, from home (or any other computer) twenty-four hours a day. In addition to 58,000 life stories, the ODNB offers a free, twice monthly biography podcast with over 130 life stories now available. You can also sign up for Life of the Day, a topical biography delivered to your inbox, or follow @ODNB on Twitter for people in the news.

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Happy Labor Day!  I’ve no special post of my own but I know someone who has created the ultimate list of Labor Songs. That would be Professor Phil Nel and at this point I’ve only seen the first of three posts but it is truly fantastic.  For one thing, he includes Moxy Früvous on his round-up, and they were a band I adored back in the days of my youth.  I’d forgotten all about “I Love My Boss” until now.  Go!  Look!  It’s worth your time.

Now I’ve been amiss in not mentioning the speaking engagement I have at the upcoming Kidlitosphere Conference.  I won’t be there in person, but through the magic of technology I’ll be Skyping alongside the hugely talented Mary Ann Scheuer of Great Kid Books and the simply marvelous Paula Wiley of Pink Me.  Our topic?  Mary Ann came up with the notion of covering book app features.  What we like, what we don’t, what to look for, etc.  And if you cannot attend, we may be able to put something on our blogs afterwards.  Stay tuned or read more about the talk here.

New Blog Alert: Speaking of apps, ever wonder why there isn’t a children’s literature blog dedicated to the digital realm?  Turns out, there is and it’s called dot.Momming.  Children’s author and founder of the Hyde Park/South Side Network for SCBWI-Illinois, Kate Hannigan, provides reviews as well as multiple interviews with folks working in the field.  I’m a fan, and not least because an app I helped advise (Hildegard Sings) shows up as number one on her Top Picture Book Apps list.

I like to see good work rewarded.  And Kate Messner’s efforts to bring attention to the libraries devastated after Hurricane Irene certainly qualifies as more than simply “good”.  The fact that School Library Journal highlighted her work in the piece Author Kate Messner Helps to Rebuild Local NY Library Devastated By Hurricane Irene is just icing on the cake.  And much to my astonishment it include a photograph of a Paddington book that I apparently read as a child but had entirely forgotten about until I saw it in the article.  Wow!  It’s been a long time since that happened.

Need a good website for writing exercises?  Have you seen the delightful They Fight Crime?  Try it.  Then try again and again.  My current favorite is, “He’s a globe-trotting drug-addicted hairdresser on the edge. She’s a tortured belly-dancing vampire operating on the wrong side of the law. They fight crime!”  Hours of time wasting fun to be had there.

Every other day an adult author gets it into their head that writing for children is a snap (sometimes with horrific results).  Children’s authors rarely go the other way around.  Now Eoin Colfer has decided to change all that.  A comedic crime thriller called Plugged is 5 Comments on Fusenews: Haggis and Hash Browns, last added: 9/5/2011