Kirsty Gunn: We should promote the concept of ‘Archive’ as part of the Scottish experience

Oh, Mum! The face was lit up. The eyes were shining. “It was… “ Big intake of breath… “A-mazing!” This outburst came from my eldest daughter following her first day on “work experience” in a historical archive – and given that the average teenager is not a creature given to outbursts of publicly demonstrated enthusiasm I had to take her expression of unalloyed delight pretty seriously. Not that I was surprised. The archive she was talking about wasn’t any old archive. Dr Caroline Brown had given Millie permission to have a stint helping out with some sorting and filing at the extraordinary treasure trove that sits beneath the floor of the main Tower Building at the University of Dundee.