The 1970's in Scotland were a dark period. Deindustrialization had led to the shrinking of traditional industries and with it saw unemployment hit record highs. Scottish born author William McIlvanney's Laidlaw, published in 1977, is a novel that illustrates Scotland's, and particularly Glasgow's, changing social and economic landscape at the time. In addition to writing a thrilling detective novel, McIlvanney succeeded in giving voice to the multitude of different characters that comprised 1970s Glasgow, as well as representing the diverse attitudes that enveloped the city. Through the novel's central characters, readers become familiarized with the anxiety, antiauthoritarianism and class separation that enclosed the city in the 1970s. .
As mentioned, the 1970s in Glasgow were a time of great economic strife. With jobs disappearing by the day, Glasgow's inhabitants were ripe with uncertainty as well as fear in regards to what their futures may hold. It is my belief that in William McIlvanney's Laidlaw the novels antagonist, Tommy Bryson, can be perceived in many ways as a representation of the societal angst surrounding the city at the time. In the stories opening chapter McIlvanney takes a non-traditional approach to crime literature as he reveals to readers the novel's killer. Although we do not initially find out the name of the killer, we more importantly are granted access into his inner dialogue and thought process. While unconventional, McIlvanney's nonlinear approach to Laidlaw's narrative helps readers gain insight into what would otherwise be a surely misunderstood character. From the novel's opening lines Tommy displays clearly psychopathic as well as dissociative tendencies, however it is these tendencies that allow me to believe his character's feelings are ones that would be shared and sympathized with amongst Glasgow's large, suddenly unemployed population. On the opening page Tommy states, "The strangest thing was no warning.
