Pitlochry Lady Attacks Land-owning

Nothing untoward, you understand – this is not a case of assault with umbrella on members of the Perthshire aristocracy. Shirley-Anne Hardy, who is in her eighties and does not own a computer, has nevertheless managed to publish a hefty book called Stolen Land – Stolen Lives and the great con trick of Debt! (her exclamation mark.) It is formidably well researched, quoting sources that range from Jesus Christ and the Koran to Zola, Longfellow, Carnegie and Confucius. It includes a comment from George Orwell, who said, ‘The logical end of mechanical progress is to reduce the human being to something resembling a brain in a bottle.’

Ms Hardy’s thesis is a classic one – that land belongs to itself, not to any human being. It was there before the human race evolved, and will still be there (with any luck) when homo non-sapiens has muddled itself into extinction.  We may establish use of it for a while, and should during that time steward it well, though this is not always the case. We may imprison it in a carapace of stone and tarmac by building cities on it. We may play golf on it, shoot grouse on it, mine it for minerals, farm it for food and bury it under motorways, but in the end, it retains its own identity, indifferent to the notion of ownership. A quote from a protest song that circulated during the time of the Enclosures says it all:

            The law indicts the man or woman
            Who steals the goose from off the common –
            But lets the greater felon loose
Who steals the common from the goose.

If anyone would like a copy of Stolen Land, drop a line to the redoubtable Shirley-Anne Hardy at The Rocks, Pitlochry, Perthshire, PH1 3DZ.