Scotsman journalist 'passed a torch' from Allan Massie to be made fellow of Royal Society of Literature

Mr Kelly, who has been literary editor of Scotland on Sunday for more than 20 years, is one of 22 new fellows, including Nigella Lawson and Lauren Child, elected to the RSL.

Author of books including The Book of Lost Books, Scott-Land: The Man who Invented a Nation and The Minister and the Murderer, Mr Kelly has also presented documentaries on radio and television, and is a regular chair at literary festivals.

Mr Kelly said he felt he had filled a “quota of tweedy Borderers” as he was granted the honour months after the death of Mr Massie, The Scotsman’s chief fiction reviewer for more than 25 years and the author of 20 novels.

Other Scottish fellows previously elected include Douglas Dunn, Jenni Fagan, Janice Galloway, Armando Ianucci, A L Kennedy, Ian Rankin, Maggie O’Farrell, Andy O’Hagan, Ali Smith, Don Paterson, Alexander McCall Smith and Val McDermid.

Mr Kelly said: “I was certainly very surprised when I got the email saying I had been elected. The RSL isn’t like the French Academy - it’s not a limited number of fellows where new fellows are only elected when another one dies - but I would like to think that in some ways a sort of torch has been passed to me from Allan Massie, with whom I worked for so many years. Maybe there’s a special quota of tweedy Borderers.

“It’s also a privilege in that I very much appreciate the work the RSL does, especially concerning the threats to authorship coming from AI, illegal scraping of texts and the plummeting advances - they are a kind of bulwark, and a body that will insist we can’t go back to a place where only the rich have the luxury to write literature.”

He added: “Although the award is primarily for my creative work - The Book of Lost Books, Scott-Land: The Man Who Invented A Nation and The Minister and the Murderer, as well as for my radio work, it was also evidently for being a critic. This is my 25th year writing for Scotland on Sunday, and I’ve never actually missed a week, even when I was hospitalised for weeks.”

Mr Kelly admitted he had given a “not particularly enthusiastic review” to the latest novel of the RSL president, Elif Shafak, saying he had been “worried” it could harm his chances.

”It passed without incident I’m pleased to say,” he said. “It might even show that we can disagree without being disagreeable, a lesson that a great many arts bodies, political communities and pressure groups might do well to imitate.”

Other fellows elected alongside Mr Kelly include Arifa Akbar, Jake Arnott, Joanna Biggs, Dinah Birch, Leo Boix, James Campbell, Patricia Duncker, Melissa Harrison, Sophie Herxheimer, Katie Hickman, Kapka Kassabova, Roger Lewis, Tim Liardet, Ankhi Mukherjee, Chris Riddell, Claudia Roden, Lola Shoneyin, Nell Stevens and Philip Terry.

Meanwhile, six other authors - Paul Burston, Elise Dillsworth, Ted Hodgkinson, Caroline McCormick, Judith Palmer and Reza Vishkai - were also announced as honorary fellows, while the Benson Medal has been awarded to writer, journalist and broadcaster Judith Palmer.

The RSL’s Honorary Fellows are individuals who have made a significant contribution to the advancement of literature in the UK, or who have rendered special service to the society. Founded in 1916 by scholar, author and RSL Fellow AC Benson, the Benson Medal honours service to literature across a whole career.