Bella – a Platform for Many Voices
We’ve revamped our Contributors section so you can see more of your favourite writers. As we’re about to launch our two annual Guest Editors of the year, this is a good opportunity to showcase some of our writers and invite contributions. Contact us here with your pitch.
This is a small sample of the range of writers we publish every day …
COLUMNISTS
We currently have four regular columnists: Playwright and writer George Gunn has a long-running column From the Province of the Cat which looks out at the world from Thurso, Caithness (with a long view). Read all his writing here. Layla-Roxanne Hill is a Glasgow-based “writer/artist/activist” focusing on decolonialism, intersectional feminism and media democracy. Read all of her articles here. Film-maker and former MP George Kerevan writes a weekly economics column. He is the author of Tackling Timorous Economics, with Katherine Trebeck and Stephen Boyd and a board member of Common Weal. Read all his articles here. Inverness-based Mairi McFadyen writes on highland and rural Scotland, climate change, land reform, gaelic culture and geopoetics (amongst other things). Read all her writing here.
GAELIC AND SCOTS
We publish in three languages. In our Ghetto na Gàidhlig (gaelic ghetto – it’s an in joke) you can read Duncan Sneddon, Marcas Mac an Tuairneir, Abi Lightbody, Neil Kempsell, Calum MacLeod, Daibhidh Rothach, Arthur Cormack, Rona Dhòmhnallach, Ruairidh MacÌomhair, Fearghas MacFhionnlaigh and many more. You can read Griogair Labhruidh who writes on gaelic language and culture drawing on the traditions of both North Argyll and North East Skye.
Read all of our Gaelic content here.
In our Scots section we publish Tammas Clark, Janet Fenton, Stewart Bremner, Alistair Heather, Sara Clark, Billy Kay, Elizabeth Thoumire, James Robertson, Stuart Paterson, Rachel Mackay, Ashley Douglas, Lisa Simmons, Sheena Blackhall, Katie Gallogly-Swan, Matthew Fitt, Karen Campbell and loads more.
Read all of or content in Scots here.
COMMENTARY
Just to give a sample of some of our writers from A-Z (ish) …
Writer (and occasional stand-up) AL Kennedy writes on rights, art and humanity. Playwright and author Alan Bissett writes about politics and broken Britain and the erosion of Scottish democracy. Read him here. Poet and artist Alec Finlay writes about art and re-wilding and huts and how communicate about the world. Andy Wightman writes on land reform (mostly) but also housing, ecology and democracy.
Brian Quail is a veteran peace-activist, campaigner and writer. He has been writing for Bella caledonia since our very first issue.
Cat Boyd was the co-founder of the Radical Independence Campaign as part of Scotland’s independence referendum of 2014, she is a trade union organiser and activist. She wrote Scottish Independence: a Feminist Response.
Irvine Welsh (has written a few books) writes for Bella about culture, politics and change and crisis. Lesley Riddoch is a presenter, author, broadcaster and head of the Nordic Horizons think-tank. Darren McGarvey (Loki) is a rapper, columnist and author of the award-winning Poverty Safari. Watch our interview with him here.
Neil Cooper writes on music and culture, the attacks on live music venues and theatre. Paul Tritschler writes dreamy undefinable stories about the past and psychology. Playwright (and author) Peter Arnott writes about Brexit and independence and other stuff. He wrote the epic “Dinner with No Voters or “What I wanted to say before the Pudding hit the fan” in 2014.
This is only a tiny selection of our writers. See the full list here.
If commentary, analysis and opinion is our meat and drink, we also do other stuff too … see our ARTS AND CULTURE content here covering music, poetry, art, film, theatre and review … and our INTERNATIONAL section here.
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That’s damn impressive!
Nothing wrong with this spread, but still a bit light on philosophy and the technology-science-futurism that you might use to model the alternate social arrangements of tomorrow, systems and patterns. There’s some interesting (if occasionally dystopic) speculation about Scottish independence in science fiction. Should that state of affairs be achieved in the next few years, hindsight will look at how well these times predicted and prepared. I’m sure someone somewhere is researching how (if at all) a modern/future Scotland is represented in video game culture, the most immersive of artforms, and one which can incorporate poetry, song, graphic art, video, animation, dialogue, architecture (and so on) while appealing to all ages, across social divisions.
Where is the future being written now? The technology companies which shape so much of the modern world came from somewhere a generation back.