Dame Carol Ann Duffy is a Scottish poet and playwright. She is a professor of contemporary poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University, and was appointed Poet Laureate in May 2009, and her term expired in 2019. She was the first female poet laureate, the first Scottish-born poet and the first openly lesbian poet to hold the Poet Laureate position.
Helen Dunmore FRSL was a British poet, novelist, and short story and children's writer.
Jo Shapcott is an English poet, editor and lecturer who has won the National Poetry Competition, the Commonwealth Poetry Prize, the Costa Book of the Year Award, a Forward Prizes for Poetry and the Cholmondeley Award.
Liz Lochhead Hon FRSE is a Scottish poet, playwright, translator and broadcaster. Between 2011 and 2016 she was the Makar, or National Poet of Scotland, and served as Poet Laureate for Glasgow between 2005 and 2011.
Caitríona O'Reilly is an Irish poet and critic.
Kathleen Jamie FRSL is a Scottish poet and essayist. In 2021 she became Scotland's fourth Makar.
Grace Nichols FRSL is a Guyanese poet who moved to Britain in 1977, before which she worked as a teacher and journalist in Guyana. Her first collection, I is a Long-Memoried Woman (1983), won the Commonwealth Poetry Prize. In December 2021, she was announced as winner of the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry.
Imtiaz Dharker is a Pakistani-born British poet, artist, and video film maker. She won the Queen's Gold Medal for her English poetry and was appointed Chancellor of Newcastle University from January 2020.
Stewart Conn is a Scottish poet and playwright, born in Hillhead, Glasgow. His father was a minister at Kelvinside Church but the family moved to Kilmarnock, Ayrshire in 1941 when he was five. During the 1960s and 1970s, he worked for the BBC at their offices off Queen Margaret Drive and moved to Edinburgh in 1977, where until 1992 he was based as BBC Scotland's head of radio drama. He was Edinburgh's first makar or poet laureate in 2002–05.
John Agard FRSL is a Guyanese playwright, poet and children's writer, now living in Britain. In 2012, he was selected for the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry. He was awarded BookTrust's Lifetime Achievement Award in November 2021.
Julia Copus FRSL is a British poet, biographer and children's writer.
Tishani Doshi FRSL is an Indian poet, journalist and dancer based in Chennai. In 2006 she won the Forward Prize for Best First Collection due to Countries of the Body. Her poetry book A God at the Door was later shortlisted for the 2021 Forward Prize for Best Collection. She was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2023.
Bernardine Anne Mobolaji Evaristo is a British author and academic. Her novel Girl, Woman, Other jointly won the Booker Prize in 2019 alongside Margaret Atwood's The Testaments, making her the first Black woman to win the Booker. Evaristo is Professor of Creative Writing at Brunel University London and President of the Royal Society of Literature, the second woman and the first black person to hold the role since it was founded in 1820.
Kate Clanchy MBE is a British poet, freelance writer and teacher.
Clare Pollard FRSL is a British writer, literary translator and critic. She was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature in 2024.
Sasha Dugdale FRSL is a British poet, playwright, editor and translator. She has written six poetry collections and is a translator of Russian literature.
Ailbhe Darcy is an Irish poet and Wales Book of the Year award laureate.
Claire Askew is a Scottish novelist and poet.
Darling: New & Selected Poems is a poetry book by Jackie Kay. It was first published by Bloodaxe Books on 27 October 2007. Gap Year, Keeping Orchids, Lucozade, My Grandmother's Houses, Old Tongue, and Whilst Leila Sleeps are all National 5 Scottish texts.
The Adoption Papers is the debut poetry collection by the Scottish poet Jackie Kay. It was published in 1991 by Bloodaxe Books. It won the Forward Prize for best first collection.
