Real Glasgow

Revisiting his native city, Ian Spring’s new book charts how it has changed over the last forty years.

In Real Glasgow he visits the city’s landmarks, and also his personal landmarks, overlaying the current map of Glasgow with the map in his memory. Among the shipyards of Govan, the tombs of the Necropolis and the dark beauty of St Mungo’s cathedral, the cathedrals of Ibrox and Hampden Park, the disappearing tenements, the growing café culture and old fashioned pubs, Spring recalls the vitality of past times and finds a new and different contemporary vitality.

The characters of his childhood (as featured in the work of Billy Connolly, for example), largely hewn from heavy industry, brownstone courts and socialism have largely been reduced by education, the service industries and the benefits of consumerism.

But as Real Glasgow attests, the city still has its idiosyncrasies and essentially Glaswegian aspects to be found nowhere else. Exploration and celebration, this book leaves the reader informed and entertained about one of the most famous cities in the world.