Raasay
The poet Sorley MacLean was born in Osgaig, a small crofting community on the west coast of the island; perhaps his most famous poem is about "Hallaig", an abandoned community on the east coast. MacLean's writings often combine an ancient traditional awareness, with a modernist political outlook, in which Raasay, and the areas adjacent to it are frequently referenced. But while MacLean's work dwells on the brutality of war, of the Highland Clearances and modern exploitation, he also writes about nature. Thus, although the Clearances leave an empty landscape populated only by the ghosts of those evicted or forced to emigrate, "Time, the deer, is in the Wood of Hallaig".
Larry McLean
McLean was born in Fredericton, New Brunswick. He earned the nickname Larry after the alternate moniker ascribed to Nap Lajoie, a star baseball player who McLean was said to resemble. In 1901, while McLean and Fred Mitchell were playing for a local team in Saint John, New Brunswick, they were scouted and signed by the fledgling Boston Red Sox.