Hugh Miller was one of the great Scots of his age, possessed of an intellect driven by an insatiable curiosity and a wide range of interests. He developed his lifelong fascination with natural history initially as an almost entirely self-taught amateur geologist. His discoveries of Devonian fossil fish, as described in The Old Red Sandstone (1841) and Footprints of the Creator (1847), elevated him into the front rank of natural scientists of his time. He won pre-eminence as a populariser of this then new science with his wonderful powers of description. In 2015/2016, to encourage a renewed interest in the work of one of Scotland’s greatest nature writers and a greater awareness and appreciation of Scotland’s geodiversity, the Friends of Hugh Miller, the Scottish Geodiversity Forum and others organised the Hugh Miller Writing Competition, which invited entries inspired by Miller’s geological and landscape writings. This installation presents a selection of shortlisted and winning poems, and extracts from these poems, together with artwork inspired by Hugh Miller’s own writings. 

See also our Meet the Artist event for this installation.

In association with Edinburgh Geological Society, St Andrews University Geobus, The Scottish Centre for Geopoetics, Our Dynamic Earth and Lochaber Geopark. Supported by EventScotland and part of Scotland’s Year of History, Heritage and Archaeology 2017