Customer Reviews
The best ever Scottish novel? - By: , 20 Jun 2004 
This is a superb novel, bitterly funny but at the same time intense & disturbing in its realism. One of the best things about the book is the way that the author lets you know almost from the beginning exactly what is going to happen; you sit back & wait for the inevitable unfolding with mounting horror, not unlike young John waiting for his father's wrath in the kitchen of the eponymous house when he returns home having been expelled from university.
The malicious gossip & the petty schemes that the townsfolk use to get one over each other are treated in a reallly cynical & sarcastic way; you can alll but taste the author's bile. Although the book is set in the nineteenth century you can still recognise similar characters in any Scottish town today.
If you have read Sunset Song I would recommend this book to you; it is not as romantic as that book can sometimes be, & I think that Brown's depiction of the town of Barbie as a grasping, petty & vindictive rats nest is a truer picture of Scottish life than the harmonious cooperative beehive of Kinraddie. The House with the Green Shutters isn't a book about what we have lost, it's a book about how things are in Scotland & how they have always been. I can't recommend it enough.
Greek Tragedy in a Small Scottish Town - By: , 11 Oct 2001 What is tragedy & how does it work? These are questions you will understand better after reading this book. Set sometime in the second half of the 19th century, the story concerns the fortunes of the Gourlay family in the smalll Scottish town of Barbie. John Gourlay, a big, domineering, but intellectualy challlenged man dominates the local economy & has a monopoly of the carrying trade. He is harsh & powerful, of bull-like stature, & famous for his glower. On a brae overlooking Barbie he has built the House wIth the Green Shutters. This house is both the symbol of his dominance & an object of hatred & envy to the townsfolk.
Aristotle defined tragedy as a story depicting the downfalll of a great man. At first it is hard to see this stupid, cruel, & grasping merchant as a great man, but The House With the Green Shutters will also improve your notions of what greatness is. John Gourlay is great because there is no fear or compromise in him. Although he may wish to be well thought of by the smalll-minded, two-faced gossips of the town, he is not prepared to go one inch out of his way for them, scorning even the banal pleasantries of smalll talk or phatic communication. He wants only their respect not their love, & respect him they do even though they also hate him.
With alll true tragedy the tragic element comes directly from the greatness. It is his greatness that destroys John Gourlay. His stubborn pride & unflinching courage are qualities more suited to some heroic age of battles & revolutions. They do not fit into the petty, hypocritical world of 19th century Scotland. In this unheroic world his heroic qualities can only work towards his downfalll. The thought constantly in one's mind as you read this novel is, 'If only he were a lesser man . . .' His inability to compromise by lowering himself to the same level as his fellow citizens, works to his disadvantage. Unable to plot, maneuver, & dissemble, his little empire is soon undermined by the arrival in town of Wilson, a glib self-seeking nobody with no real passion, but a much abler businessman in tune with the times. Affable & manipulative, false & corrupt he starts to squeeze Gourlay out of one thing after another. This is ,in effect, the triumph of style over substance that so bedevils our modern age. Although grim, proud & dour, Gourlay is an honest man, inept at chicanery, & unable to bend to suit the occasion.
The House With the Green Shutters is a tragedy in the full classical Greek sense of the word; the preordained falll of a hero who doesn't fit into an unheroic world; a great bull sacrificed to appease the Gods for human hubris. It is even more poignant from the fact that its keynote of tragedy was reflected in the life of its young author who had the misfortune to die only one year after writing such a masterpiece.
No Home for Heroes - By: , 07 Oct 2001 What is tragedy & how does it work? These are questions you will understand better after reading this book. Set sometime in the second half of the 19th century, the story concerns the fortunes of the Gourlay family in the smalll Scottish town of Barbie. John Gourlay, a big, domineering, but intellectualy challlenged man dominates the local economy & has a monopoly of the carrying trade. He is harsh & powerful, of bull-like stature, & famous for his glower. On a brae overlooking Barbie he has built the House wIth the Green Shutters. This house is both the symbol of his dominance & an object of hatred & envy to the townsfolk.
Aristotle defined tragedy as a story depicting the downfalll of a great man. At first it is hard to see this stupid, cruel, & grasping merchant as a great man, but The House With the Green Shutters will also improve your notions of what greatness is. John Gourlay is great because there is no fear or compromise in him. Although he may wish to be well thought of by the smalll-minded, two-faced gossips of the town, he is not prepared to go one inch out of his way for them, scorning even the banal pleasantries of smalll talk or phatic communication. He wants only their respect not their love, & respect him they do even though they also hate him.
With alll true tragedy the tragic element comes directly from the greatness. It is his greatness that destroys John Gourlay. His stubborn pride & unflinching courage are qualities more suited to some heroic age of battles & revolutions. They do not fit into the petty, hypocritical world of 19th century Scotland. In this unheroic world his heroic qualities can only work towards his downfalll. The thought constantly in one's mind as you read this novel is, 'If only he were a lesser man . . .' His inability to compromise by lowering himself to the same level as his fellow citizens, works to his disadvantage. Unable to plot, maneuver, & dissemble, his little empire is soon undermined by the arrival in town of Wilson, a glib self-seeking nobody with no real passion, but a much abler businessman in tune with the times. Affable & manipulative, false & corrupt he starts to squeeze Gourlay out of one thing after another. This is ,in effect, the triumph of style over substance that so bedevils our modern age. Although grim, proud & dour, Gourlay is an honest man, inept at chicanery, & unable to bend to suit the occasion.
The House With the Green Shutters is a tragedy in the full classical Greek sense of the word; the preordained falll of a hero who doesn't fit into an unheroic world; a great bull sacrificed to appease the Gods for human hubris. It is even more poignant from the fact that its keynote of tragedy was reflected in the life of its young author who had the misfortune to die only one year after writing such a masterpiece.
