Wednesday 8th December 2021, 5.15-6.45pm, Byre Theatre
“It was lovely to hear the Gaelic…”
Pàdraig MacAoidh will discuss his own work as a poet and editor, and address the questions of what it means to write – and read – Gaelic poetry in contemporary Scotland, and the bridges between Gaelic poetry and other European literatures.
Pàdraig MacAoidh / Peter Mackay is a poet, lecturer and broadcaster. He has two collections of poems Nàdur De (Some Kind of, 2020) and Gu Leòr (Galore, 2015), both published by Acair, and a pamphlet, From Another Island, with Clutag Press (2010). He largely writes in Gàidhlig and English, and his work has been translated into Czech, French, German, Irish, Occitan, Macedonian and Slovakian. He has co-edited the anthologies An Leabhar Liath: 500 years of Gaelic love and transgressive verse (with Iain S MacPherson), 100 Dàn as Fheàrr Leinn / 100 Favourite Gaelic Poems (with Jo MacDonald) and The Golden Treasury of Scottish Verse (with Don Paterson and Kathleen Jamie). His academic work includes the books This Strange Loneliness: Heaney’s Wordsworth (2021) and Sorley MacLean (2011); he is a Senior Lecturer in literature in the School of English at the University of St Andrews, and has been an AHRC / Radio 3 New Generation Thinker.