The Scottish Enlightenment

(Hume, Burns, Scott – and Nassau Hall)

A conversation with David W. R. Purdie MD FRCP Ed. FRSSA FSA Scot.
Honorary Fellow, Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, University of Edinburgh

David Purdie is interested in the history, literature, and philosophy of the 18th-century Scottish Enlightenment, particularly the work of Sir Walter Scott, Robert Burns, and David Hume. Previously, he was a clinical dean of the School of Medicine at the University of Leeds, where his research was on the diagnosis and treatment of osteoporosis. He co-edited The Burns Encyclopaedia and Thring’s Practical Legislation and has also published new editions of Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe and The Heart of Midlothian. His humorous writing includes his book on golf history, The Ancyent Exercyse of the Golff, and The Dean’s Diaries. A noted public speaker, speechwriter, and voiceover artist, he is a past chairman of the Sir Walter Scott Club and the Saints and Sinners Club of Scotland, which raises funds for small Scottish charities. He is president in Scotland of the Lord’s Taverners, the UK’s cricketing charity.

Reception to follow.