Are the peripheries the new centre? How do the 'debatable lands' of Scandinavia and Scotland write their relations with their national centres, and with each other? Is the story of the margins just a figment of the metropole's imagination? How have postcolonialism and postnationalism made themselves felt in the literature of the cultural patchwork of Northern Europe? In these sixteen essays, Scandinavian and Scottish scholars trace ways to tell the stories of connections, boundaries and localities that might go undetected by historians and artists in the metropolitan centres. Centring on the Peripheries opens up unexpected perspectives on cultural roots and on the routes between cultures, demonstrating that relations between 'core' and 'periphery' are in constant flux. It will appeal to scholars of cultural identity, postcolonialism and European literature, and to readers who delight in exploring the borderlands of the literary canon.