Lewis Grassic Gibbon was born James Leslie Mitchell at the dawn of the twentieth century in 1901 in Aberdeenshire. Spending most of his childhood in Arbuthnott, a farming community in the Mearns, his family and community's tie to the land was to create a love-hate relationship between this area and the writer which lasted until his early death in 1935.

Mitchell left school early after arguments with the school authorities in Mackie Academy, Stonehaven. As a journalist in Aberdeen and briefly in Glasgow, he became increasingly involved in left-wing politics and helped to form the Aberdeen Soviet. His short experience of Glasgow, its slums, and its Red Clydeside movement led him to later criticise the Scottish Renaissance movement for not dealing with urban issues and the horrific slums of Glasgow.

Having been sacked from the 'Scottish Farmer' paper for fraudulent expense claims, Mitchell later joined the army more for the food and shelter it offered than for any patriotic reason. Although Mitchell hated life in the army, it did allow him to travel, in particular to the Middle East and Egypt, which fuelled his interest in ancient civilisations and the theory of diffusionism. His military experiences in the Middle East inspired his first short stories and much of his fiction and non-fiction.

From 1930 to 1934, eleven novels, two books of short stories, three anthropological books and an 'Intelligent Man's Guide to Albyn' with Hugh MacDiarmid entitled Scottish Scene, were published under the names Mitchell and Gibbon. On his death in 1935, outlines of many other books, from novels to an autobiography were left.

The most important of this author’s vast output in such a small amount of time is the trilogy of novels, A Scots Quair published under the name Lewis Grassic Gibbon (taken from the author's mother's maiden name). The Quair, and in particular Sunset Song, has outlived much of his other work to become a Scottish classic.