Alexander Scott (20th-century poet) explained

Alexander Scott (1920–1989) was a Scottish poet, playwright and scholar born in Aberdeen. He wrote poetry in both Scots and Scottish English as well as plays, literary reviews and critical studies of literature. As a writer, scholar, dramatist, broadcaster, critic and editor, he showed a life-long commitment to Scottish literary culture.^[1] He was latterly a tutor and reader of Scottish literature at the University of Glasgow, where he was instrumental in establishing Scotland's first Department of Scottish Literature in the academic year 1971–72.

In 1972, Scott was one of the founders of the Lallans Society (later the Scots Language Society). He was a member of its committee from the outset and served as Preses from 1974 to 1977 and from 1979 to 1983. He also served as president of the Association for Scottish Literary Studies from 1976 to 1979. In 1985 he succeeded Robert McLellan as Honorary Preses.^[2]

In 1983, Scott became a founding editor of the periodical New Writing Scotland.

On 27th November 1989, The Scots Independent and the Scots Language Society presented a celebration of the poetry and prose of Alexander Scott at the Netherbow Theatre in Edinburgh.

Works

Books

• Selected Poems, Saltire Modern Poets series, Oliver and Boyd, Edinburgh, 1950
• Still Life: William Soutar, 1898 - 1943, Chambers, 1958
• The MacDiarmid Makars, 1923 - 1972, Akros Publications, 1972
• Double Agent: Poems in English and Scots, Akros Publications, 1972
• Neil M. Gunn

The Man and the Writer (contributing editor), Blackwood, Edinburgh, 1973,

• Selected Poems, 1943 - 1974, Akros Publications, 1975
• Modern Scots Verse 1922 - 1977 (Editor), Akros Publications, 1978
• Scotch Passion: An Anthology of Scottish Erotic Poetry (Editor), Robert Hale, 1982
• Voices of Our Kind: An Anthology of Modern Scottish Poetry from 1920 to the Present (Editor), Larousse Kingfisher Chambers, 1987
• The Comic Poems of William Tennant (Editor), Association for Scottish Literary Studies, 1989
• Sing Frae the Hert: The Literary Criticism of Alexander Scott (edited by Neil R. MacCallum), Scottish Cultural Press, 1996,

Articles

• The Makar Fergusson, in Annand, J.K. (ed.), Lallans, Number 2: Whitsunday 1974, The Lallans Society, pp. 7 - 9
• Edwin Morgan

Experimenter Extraordinary, in Lindsay, Maurice (ed.), The Scottish Review: Arts and Environment 28, November 1982, pp. 22 – 26,

• Pink Elephants in Anstruther: Scottish Identity, in Lindsay, Maurice (ed.), The Scottish Review: Arts and Environment 33, February 1984, pp. 3 – 8,

Reviews

• Campbell, Ian (1975), review of Selected Poems, 1943 - 1974, in Burnett, Ray (ed.), Calgacus No. 3, Spring 1976, pp. 54 – 56,

External links

• International journal of Scottish literature review of David Robb's biography of Alexander Scott.
• J Derrick McClure, online biography of Alexander Scott

Notes and References

1. Campbell, Donald (1990), Alexander Scott - Maister Makar, in Purves, David (ed.), Lallans Nummer 34: Whitsuntid 1990, pp. 28 & 29, ; reprinted in Purves, David and MacCallum, Neil R. (eds.) (1995), Mak it New: An Anthology of Twenty-One Years of Writing in "Lallans", The Mercat Press, Edinburgh, pp. 38 - 40,
2. Purves, David, Obituary: Alexander Scott, in Lallans Nummer 33, Mairtinmas 1989, p. 32,