Robin Robertson Clinches £25,000 Walter Scott Prize

Poet Robin Robertson has clinched the £25,000 Walter Scott Prize for historical fiction.

According to the BBC, Robertson is the first Scot to win the award given out at the Borders Book Festival in Melrose – in its 10-year history.

His winning book, The Long Take, is written in a combination of verse and prose – echoing a format often used by Scott himself. His work was praised for its “very particular magnetic force” which drew judges back “again and again, each time marvelling anew”.

“The Long Take recounts the inner journey of Canadian veteran Joe Walker as he travels from New York to Los Angeles and San Francisco attempting to rebuild his life after living through the horrors of war in Europe,” said the judges.

“In poetry of the utmost beauty, Robin Robertson interweaves themes from the great age of black and white films, the destruction of communities as cities destroy the old to build the new, the horrors of McCarthyism and the terrible psychological wounds left by war.

“Robertson shows us things we’d rather not see and asks us to face things we’d rather not face.

“But with the pulsing narrative drive of classic film noir, the vision of a poet, and the craft of a novelist, The Long Take courageously and magnificently boosts the Walter Scott Prize into its next decade.”