Whaur's ma smeddum, ma fusion, ma guts?

    I have a lot of books that I should be talking about but somehow today I'm 'fusionless', uninspired and disinclined to make the effort, so as we haven't had a 'good words' post for some time, this will suffice. If you click on the link above and then on the wee recording you'll hear how the word is said when it has an 'h' in the middle; my Highland grandmother used to say it, but with a longer 'u', no 'h', and a harder 's', and indeed the Scots dictionary gives many spellings and examples of usage - I can't link directly but if you're so minded you can put the word in the search box here and you should find them.

    Smeddum is another very good word meaning "spirit, energy, drive, vigorous resourcefulness” (there's more on it here), and of course it was the title of a short story by Lewis Grassic Gibbon; let's hope I have some of that tomorrow.

    I can't close today, though, without reference to at least one book. My wish list has grown a little longer thanks to all the collections of letters you kindly recommended in response to Sunday's post, and it was further augmented this morning by a book I hadn't come across before I saw it mentioned on Twitter, and that is Reflections: On the Magic of Writing by Diana Wynne-Jones, a collection of 25 of her articles on topics including "literary criticism (such as a study of narrative structure in The Lord of the Rings and a ringing endorsement of the value of learning Anglo Saxon), autobiographical anecdotes about reading tours (including an account of her famous travel jinx), revelations about the origins of her books, and thoughts in general about the life of an author and the value of writing". It sounds fascinating.