BREXIT Day will be a “Black Friday” the eminent historian Tom Devine has told The National.
In a brief statement for the paper to mark Scotland’s exit from the EU – despite 62% of Scots voters backing Remain – the professor says he is hopeful that Scotland will “once again be united with our European friends before too long”.
“For over 600 years between the 12th and early 18th century, Scotland's most intimate external relations were with Europe. That can be so again.”
Devine is one of 40 figures from the world of arts, music, literature and politics to share their thoughts on Brexit Day exclusively in tomorrow's National.
READ MORE: This is what the Scottish Government has planned for Brexit Day
Crime writer Val McDermid says it will be “a day of deep mourning”.
She told us: “We've had peaceful relations with our neighbours, which few would have predicted with confidence in the 1950s. And we've enjoyed a freedom of movement and exposure to other cultures that we've embraced and learned from. Let's hope we can soon return to the EU as an independent nation.”
The writer Andrew O’Hagan predicts that Brexit “will be the founding stone upon which Scotland will build its future self-governance.”
While Asif Khan, Scottish Poetry Library director, described Brexit as “a fool's paradise”.
Singer Sheena Wellington said she was “angry” that the children of her family “will be robbed of opportunities to freely travel, study, work, live and love in whichever EU country they choose”.
Across politics, and across the SNP there were splits over what Brexit might mean.
While many of his colleagues lamented our exit from the EU, and said it wouldn't be too long before Scotland rejoins, SNP MSP Alex Neil said that it was time for his party to “adapt to the new situation”.
He told us it was “time to move on and stop fighting the battles of yesteryear”.
“Over the next few months that means doing all we can as a Scottish Government to promote and protect Scotland’s vital interests in the UK/EU Brexit negotiations, especially in relation to key sectors of the Scottish economy like fishing, financial services, agriculture, manufacturing, Scotland’s share of the Brexit money, etc.
“Simultaneously we must a) address the pressure points on public services which are of concern to the Scottish people and b) prepare diligently so that we have credible answers to the difficult questions on which people will decide how to vote in such a referendum; along with an ambitious economic and social reform plan for the early years of an independent Scotland.”
His Holyrood colleague Gillian Martin told us that she was saddened by the “impact on the younger generation; those didn’t have a voice in the referendum, or who overwhelmingly voted against Brexit. They are the ones who will have to pick up the pieces of decisions made now on a false promise of prosperity that will never materialise”.
READ MORE: Michael Russell tells EU: 'Leave a light on for Scotland'
Henry McLeish, the former Labour first minister said that one thing made clearer by Brexit was that “status quo unionism or further tinkering on the edges, will not suffice”.
“The Union needs a radical shake up,” he said. “If not, the Union won't survive. Brexit will be a slow but decisive burn.”
You can read the contributions from the people below in tomorrow's National.
Andrew O'Hagan
Alyn Smith
Henry McLeish
Tom Devine
Jim Sillars
Alex Orr - European Movement in Scotland
Christopher Brookmyre
Neil Forsyth
Val McDermid
Bill Drummond from the KLF
Gerard Burns
AL Kennedy
Annabelle Ewing
Asif Khan – Scottish poetry library
Bobby Bluebell
Gillian Martin
Matthew Fitt
Alex Neil
Christine Grahame
Lorna Slater
Jenny Gilruth
Aileen McLeod
Sheena Wellington
Denise Mina
Sarah Boyack
Pauline McNeill
Colin Borland
Denise Mina
Monica Lennon
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