Yesterday, Littleton High School welcomed a guest speaker, Andrew Lownie, from Edinburgh, Scotland. Lownie is a renowned ESU guest who is speaking all around the US. We are the only school in Colorado to host him.
Lownie is a fellow of the Royal Historical Society, graduate from the University of Edinburgh, author, and helped start the Spy Museum in Washington D.C. He is visiting us from his home in Edinburgh as he travels around the country discussing the history of literature in his home.
He discussed many influential authors that are from and gained inspiration from the city of Edinburgh. Throughout history Edinburgh literature has inspired many of the great and well known classical authors. These include Charles Dickens, Oscar Wilde and Muriel Spark. They included aspects of the past and current Edinburgh in their novels.
The History of Edinburgh has been changing over the centuries. Lownie described how the city has changed with the world mostly focusing on the Enlightenment period and how the literature in the city was altered with it. He also describes stories of grave robbing and scientific discoveries on human bodies, especially on how the events were brought into stories of that time period.
Lownie was one of six people to create the Spy Museum in Washington D.C.. He appreciated the history and wanted to create a museum that would commemorate the past and future of spies in the world. He asked the students how many of them have been there, and there were many people who have had very positive experiences when they visited.
We are so grateful to have Andrew Lownie visit our school and teach the language arts classes about Literary Edinburgh.
