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ST. Mary's College, Blairs, the Catholic seminary on the banks of the river Dee, five miles from Aberdeen, celebrated in 1929 its centenary. Few people, however, realise that the college has roots reaching far back into Scottish history, and that it is linked by many historical associations, but especially by its library, with the oldest of all Scottish educational establishments, the Scots College, Paris, which was founded under the auspices of King Robert the Bruce.

LITERARY cliques come and go. It is inconceivable that we should ever be without them. Sheep calls unto sheep; boobs of a feather flock together: the principle needs no elaboration. They appear from nowhere, they mutter among themselves in a strange hieratic jargon, they burgeon with aesthetic theories, and then lapse back into obscurity. There were the Imagists, who dug up one or two rancid theories from the French, wrote little pamphlets of the sort of verse long beloved by Magazines For Young Ladies, and passed away. There were the Vorticists, who presented the world with the munificent gift of an assortment of isosceles triangles. The Georgians put straw in their ears and held conversations with academic sheep and cows. More recently the London Aphrodite group insisted upon being both obscene and heard; and appointed themselves, as it were, a sort of Cook's Tourist Agency to a corybantic paradise whose sole recommendation was a profusion of bosoms and beer. And there have been others too numerous to mention. United they stand, derided they fall: and indeed it is ridicule that kills them off. The Bloomsbury Group, however, have had a long reign, and are by this time rather firmly entrenched. They cannot merely be disregarded. They cannot, like many other cliques, be laughed out of court. They are not clamorous. They do not make a parade of absurdities. Their influence is all the more potent for being, as it were, subterranean.

THE question is frequently being raised: Why did the greatest historical event of late, the European war, not essentially inspire modern fiction ? That this colossal drama of homicidal glory and appalling horrors, but also of bravery and heroism, gave birth but to a few epic and dramatic creations, seems in fact surprising.

This paper makes a contribution to the exploration of the travel type “Visiting friends and relatives (VFR)”, which is a relatively new field of research. The demarcation and the differences between VFR and other types of trip are the focus of attention of this study. Thus the research goal is to delineate the linking up of VFR with other travel types. Using data from an extensive and representative travel survey covering 2,000 households and more than 11,000 trips, this study found that about one third of the Swiss VFR travelers use commercial accommodation. Although researchers have found in other studies, that VFR type travelers tend on spending more money on meals and catering this could not be confirmed. It was also found that VFR travelers do not have a higher duration of holidays than other travelers. Besides this study determines that VFR is a truly independent travel type. Therefore it has to be looked at separately and not in connection with other travel types.

This paper provides an overview of the visiting friends and relatives category in international tourism researchover the last decade. It was delivered as a keynote paper at the international conference, “VFR Tourism: Issues and implications” held at the Victoria University of Technology, Melbourne, Australia, in October 1996.

The purpose of this paper is to consider the history and dark tourism attractions associated with a case study of the Thai-Burma Railway in the city of Kanchanaburi, Thailand. The paper considers how history has been abridged and distorted at a number of attraction sites in order to exploit the dark tourism commercial potential. The role of film media is considered as a critical element of the site narrative and the reality of the tragic past of this place is discussed within the context of Thailand’s role in the Second World War. Kanchanaburi, through the urban attractions that constitute the primary motivations for visitation, distorts and exploits its dark history for commercial and ideological purposes. Where accurate the Second World War interpretation was identified, it was maintained by balancing the requirements of national governments and institutions with acceptable levels of ambiguity and non-controversial perspectives on this urban location’s dark past.

The paper draws on literature, historical documents and tourism publications related to the Second World War and the incarceration and forced labour associated with the Thai-Burma Railway and the city of Kanchanaburi. Fieldwork incorporating tourist attraction and commemorative site visitation was undertaken in Northern Thailand in January 2017. Curators, managers, operators and tourist authorities were contacted in advance of the fieldwork by e-mail to request interviews. The sites identified were the primary sites visited by tourists, and no related Second World War site in the area was excluded. For those interviewed in relation to the subject area, a standard questionnaire based on a rolling database, relevant to particular sites was utilised. Interviews were taped and transcribed.

The city of Kanchanaburi is defined by a heritage that has changed over time. Many factors imbue the meanings and content of place. This is a function of a plethora of competing Influences and agendas; political, economic, cultural, demographic and historical. Yet, this destination is defined by the dark history of the Second World War which is associated with this place. The visitor attraction sites considered in Kanchanaburi provide multiple narratives around the Second World War events. They offer a range of content driven by influences as diverse as simple commercial gain to the complex interaction of political, economic and ideological agendas (cf. Gegner, 2012). In each case, the interpretation is used to articulate heritage through objects, artefacts, audio recording, place or imagery. These elements exist in environment(s) of their creation; the Second World War heritage of Kanchanaburi is developed in a nation that has only a partial and selective acceptance of its role in this conflict. The visitor attractions examined in this research and their content have all re-constructed and re-represented the past. Historical memorialization remains embedded in interests that are global, commercial, ideological but rarely neutral. The interpretation of the Thai-Burma Railway and the narrative of the many victims is associated with the construction merit respect, commemoration and consideration that is value free and not distorted by ideology or commercial imperatives.

This paper provides a foundation for further consideration of how such contested dark heritage is viewed not least by visitors and users. Development of research in this area would provide a valuable source of data on: consumer profiles, motivations and orientation. Relating this data to nationality and origin would provide useful comparative data to that offered by operators and managers of key attractions. Furthermore, the prevalence of social and digital media as primary tourist information source could be measured against the continued (and possibly declining) importance of the filmic narrative. Furthermore, deeper evaluation of nature and content of interpretation is merited, given the range of approaches and content observed. At a political and policy level, the treatment of this part of Thai history and the degree of sensitivity around interpretation is linked to how a nation confronts its difficult past. More thorough evaluation of treatment in national media and education curriculum also merits review. Urban heritage is an important element of urban destination marketing and evaluation based around core themes of transparency, openness, respect for the past, and sensitive treatment of tragic events offer direction for application and evaluation in other urban contexts.

This is the first time the heritage of this city has been considered in the context of dark tourism and the role of Thailand in the Second World War. It incorporates an analysis of all of the relevant attractions in the city and provides through the fieldwork conducted an original contribution to the tourism literature in this field. It draws on historical record, original documentation, interview analysis and tourism data. It provides further evidence of the dark tourism phenomena in a South East Asian context linked to a conflicted and selective appraisal of the past.

IN the Calendar of Domestic State Papers (England) for the year 1678 there is a letter containing a reference of an unusual kind to the Vatican Library, written by a man named Giles Vanbrugh to the Bishop of London at the time when the whole city, and indeed most of the nation, had gone crazy over the pretended revelations of Titus Oates. The writer of this letter, who did not see why all the conspiracy should be confined to one party, suggested a most ingenious counter‐plot. He is evidently quite serious; and his plan was perhaps quite practicable. “I shall acquaint you,” he writes to the Bishop, “with what I think not only warrantable but honourable, and what may much advantage the Protestant Religion. It is the assaulting the city of Rome on the side the Vatican stands and bringing away the library …”

This chapter presents a brief selective review of recent literature from which the operative definition “sustainability diamond” emerges. Subsequently a tourism penetration index is developed for 40 small islands with populations of less than three million. The index scores loosely arrange destinations into three development stages across the life cycle: emerging, intermediate, and high impact. Descriptive profiles of the characteristics of these three stages are presented, followed by a means difference analysis employing a dozen socioeconomic variables. The chapter concludes that these are three empirically distinct stages of development, each having major policy challenges.

This chapter explores two cases of small towns as creative places in the Galloway and Borders regions of Scotland. It considers and compares their cultural development, economic contributions, resilience and sustainability. The chapter uses prior works on policy, theory, and creative rural economies as conceptual framing.

The study is an empirical exploration, which used cultural observation as an interpretive method to undertake desk and field research in the two towns presented as cases, Wigtown (Scotland’s National Book Town) and Coldstream. It offers findings related to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the creative sector; cultural identity branding; the roles of anchor attractions and events; policy; digital economy; and cultural inclusion or exclusion. The conclusion is that creative placemaking is a medium-to-long term activity involving community and joint entrepreneurship between stakeholders to demonstrate sustainability and resilience. However, creative places need to be or become distinctive in some respects for the ingredients and enabling factors of placemaking to combine and sustain effectively as a destination.