This is an exclusive limited edition with a preface by Liz Lochhead and a new introduction by Ali Smith. Liz Lochhead is one of the leading poets writing in Britain today. This, her debut collection, published in 1972, was a landmark publication. Writing at a time when the landscape of Scottish poetry was male dominated, hers was a new voice, tackling subjects that resonated with readers - as it still does. Her poetry paved the way, and inspired, countless new voices including Ali Smith, Kathleen Jamie, Jackie Kay and Carol Ann Duffy. Still writing and performing today, fifty years on from her first book of poetry, Liz Lochhead has been awarded the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry and was Scotland's second modern Makar, succeeding Edwin Morgan. Memo for Spring is accessible, vital and always as honest as it is hopeful. Driving through this collection are themes of pain, acceptance, loss and triumph.

Liz Lochhead is one of the leading poets writing in Britain today. Her debut collection, Memo for Spring (1972), was a landmark publication. Writing at a time when the landscape of Scottish poetry was male dominated, hers was a fresh, new voice, tackling subjects that resonated with readers – as it still does. Her poetry paved the way, and inspired, countless new voices including Ali Smith, Kathleen Jamie, Jackie Kay and Carol Ann Duffy. Still writing and performing today, more than fifty years on from her first book of poetry, Liz Lochhead has been awarded the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry and was Scotland's second modern Makar, succeeding Edwin Morgan. 

This stunning collection features never before published work along with poems written during her time as Scots Makar, and marks the end of her term as Scotland's Poet Laureate (2011-2016). Whether commissioned works, such as 'Connecting Cultures', written for the Commonwealth Games in 2014 or more personal works, 'Favourite Place', about holidays in the west coast with her late husband, this collection is beautiful, sensitive and brilliant. Throughout her career Liz Lochhead has been described variously as a poet, feminist-playwright, translator and broadcaster but has said that 'when somebody asks me what I do I usually say writer. The most precious thing to me is to be a poet. If I were a playwright, I'd like to be a poet in the theatre.'

*Suitable for reading aloud - a lot of similar anthologies have weddings as their subject but don't offer really public poems *Chosen by the Scottish Poetry Library's Assistant Librarian, who has been answering the constant stream of requests for such poems for the last ten years, and knows what is valued *Introduction by one of Scotland's most famous poets *New pieces by well-known poets specially written for this volume

'She's chucked out like an old coat that nae langer fits him…' Medea and Jason, clinging together as refugees in Corinth, have struggled to bring up their beloved offspring in this alien and unsympathetic society. Now Jason has a plan to better integrate himself. Unfortunately, this involves abandoning his wife, the mother of his children… Spurned, destitute, desperate, Medea exacts her terrible retribution. Liz Lochhead's Scots-inflected version of Euripides' classic revenge tragedy was first performed by Theatre Babel in 2000 and won the Saltire Society Scottish Book of the Year Award. It was revived by the National Theatre of Scotland as part of the 2022 Edinburgh International Festival, with Adura Onashile as Medea, directed by Michael Boyd.

A modern classic about the bitter rivalry between Mary, Queen of Scots, and her cousin and fellow ruler, Elizabeth I of England - retold by Scotland's most popular playwright. 'Once upon a time, there were twa queens on the wan green island, and the wan green island was split inty twa kingdoms. But no equal kingdoms...' Mary and Elizabeth are two women with much in common, but more that sets them apart. Following the death of her husband, the Dauphin of France, the beautiful, and staunchly Catholic Mary Stuart has returned from France to rule Scotland, a country she neither knows nor understands. Ill-prepared to rule in her own right, Mary has failed to learn what her protestant cousin, Elizabeth Tudor, knows only too well - that a queen must rule with her head, not her heart. All too soon the stage is set for a deadly endgame in which there can only be one winner and one queen on the one green island. Liz Lochhead's play Mary Queen of Scots Got Her Head Chopped Off is presented in a distinctive cabaret style, with much of the dialogue in the 'Braid Scots' vernacular. It was first performed by the Communicado Theatre Company at the Lyceum Studio Theatre, Edinburgh, in August 1987. This revised version was published alongside the revival by the National Theatre of Scotland, which toured in 2009. Also included is a new introduction by the author.

Throw a stone in Edinburgh or Glasgow today and you'll hit a poet. The Scottish spoken word scene has exploded, reaching a level of popularity last seen in the late 1970s, another era, coincidentally, when the issue of Scottish self-determination was in the air. A generation of poets has emerged who have grown up in an age of change, political and technological, with the internet providing them not only with new ways of sharing writing - through their websites, podcasts, Twitter - but also in some cases with a subject too. The Sound of Youngish Scotland is the first attempt to capture the spirit of a diverse scene where every poet is their own movement - from McGuire's hilarious, Beat-inflected deconstructions of sexuality to MacGillivray's mystic tales of Scottish cowboys, equal parts MacDiarmid and McCarthy; from William Letford's building-site tales to Russell Jones' sci-fi poetry. It's a scene where you are just as liable to encounter ancient gods as you are video game characters. The Sound of Youngish Scotland features forty poets, mostly under-forty who have made Scotland their home. It's a survey, a yearbook, a celebration and a promise of things to come.

Acclaimed poet and playwright Liz Lochhead's Dracula stays refreshingly close to Bram Stoker's classic novel. Asked to adapt it by the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh, she immersed herself in the book. 'After a sleepless night,' she writes in the Introduction, 'my hair was standing on end, what with the mad Renfield in his lunatic asylum eating flies and playing John the Baptist to his coming master... and with Lucy's description of her "dream" of flying with the red-eyed one above the lighthouse at Whitby, and Jonathan's "dream" of the three Vampire Brides' advances upon him and of their being repelled at the last minute by the furious Dracula... 'This was before I'd even got to the abducted children or "the loving hand" of Lucy's fiance staking her through the heart... or that shocking rape-like bit where, with Mina's newly-wed husband Jonathan asleep in a flushed stupor by her side, Dracula, at her throat, takes his fill of her life's-blood... 'Still, what really attracted me to the story was Rule One for becoming a vampire-victim: "First of all you have to invite him in."' Liz Lochhead's stage adaptation of Dracula was first performed at the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh, in 1985. Ideal for schools and drama groups, this Dracula is all the more chilling for the respect it shows for Stoker's original nightmare creation.

Introduced by Liz Lochhead, in this selection we journey round Scotland in 'Canedolia', study its history in 'Picts', home in on Morgan's own city of Glasgow in 'Glasgow Sonnet v', imagine the country's future in 'The Coin'.

The beginning of the new decade brings with it a celebration of one of Scotland's most cherished poets, Scotland's first modern Makar, Edwin Morgan. A son of Glasgow, the city's first poet Laureate, Morgan wrote about the city he loved, the people in it and about Scotland more widely: the country that he was so passionate about. To mark the centenary, Polygon, an imprint of Birlinn Limited, is repatriating Edwin Morgan back to Scotland where he is to be published again, in association with Carcanet. Morgan was at once a prolific and eclectic writer, whose themes were as diverse as love and science fiction. And to celebrate the diversity of such a loved poet we are publishing five individual, thematically arranged, selected poems. Each book contains twenty poems, works on: love; Scotland; people and places; animals; and space. These volumes are introduced by popular names: Jackie Kay, Liz Lochhead, Ali Smith and Michael Rosen. This box set is sure to be popular with fans of his works and collectors.

Winner of an Edinburgh Fringe First Award Barbs Marshall is a celebrity hairdresser in Glasgow. She is successful and well off, but she is 39 years old and almost deafened by the ticking of her biological clock. To make matters worse, her mother is a nag, her best friend is holding out on her, and her ex-husband has a new 22-year-old girlfriend. Then she meets a 26-year-old stranger who seems more than ready to oblige. But the complications are by no means over...

Renowned poet and dramatist Liz Lochhead tells the story of Frankenstein's creation. Summer 1816. A house party on the shores of Lake Geneva. Eighteen-year-old Mary and her husband Percy Bysshe Shelley, along with Mary's half-sister Claire and the infamous Lord Byron, take part in a challenge to see who can write the most horrifying story. Mary's contribution is to become one of the most celebrated Gothic novels of all time. Using flashbacks and the rich poetic language for which she has become admired, Lochhead weaves a spider's web of connections between Mary's own tragic life and that of her literary monster. Liz Lochhead's play Blood and Ice was first performed at the Traverse Theatre, Edinburgh, as part of the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in August 1982. It was later revived, in a revised version, by David McVicar at the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in 1988, and subsequently toured by McVicar's company, Pen Name. It was again revived, in this published version, at the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh, in October 2003. As Lochhead writes in the Introduction to this revised version of the play, the myth created by Mary Shelley 'remains potent for our nuclear age, our age of astonishment and unease at the fruits of perhaps-beyond-the-boundaries genetic experimentation'.

MACCAIG * MORGAN * LOCHHEAD This book contains a selection of the finest work from three of Scotland's best-known and best-loved poets: Norman MacCaig, Edwin Morgan and Liz Lochhead. They have fascinated and charmed thousands of readers and listeners across Europe and America with the energy, humour and compassion of their vision. MacCaig's memorable celebrations of the physical world and the tragic-comic note of many of his short lyrics contrast strikingly with Morgan's poems on the modern world and city life. Liz Lochhead writes with an alert and sensitive eye on personal relationships and women's experience of them. The book provides an invaluable introduction to modern Scottish poetry and to the poets who are arguably its greatest practitioners.

A dark and wickedly funny farce about one man's twisted attempts to find a woman he can control completely. Adapted from Moliere's classic comedy The School for Wives by Liz Lochhead, 'Scotland's greatest living dramatist' (Scotland on Sunday). He's old, rich and determined to find the perfect wife. She's young, innocent and in debt to him. He'll have her by any means possible... 'Wives like your one, those with all the smarts, The ballbreakers, they're the ones to break our hearts... So pick a simple girl - it's not rocket science!' Liz Lochhead's play Educating Agnes was first staged by Theatre Babel at the Citizens Theatre, Glasgow, in 2008.

A bittersweet romantic comedy about finding love later in life, from 'Scotland's greatest living dramatist' Scotland on Sunday. Suddenly single and with the dreaded 'Big Five-0' staring her in the face, Susan also has to cope with a father in his second childhood, a daughter in the throes of aggravated adolescence and an ex who, unfortunately, still has the power to wound... Set in the charity shop where Susan is a volunteer, Good Things is a poignant, hilarious play with a lot to say about finding love the second (or third or fourth) time. It was conceived by Lochhead as a loosely thematic sequel to her earlier play Perfect Days (Traverse Theatre, 1998). Liz Lochhead's Good Things was first performed by Borderline Theatre Company, in association with the Byre Theatre, St Andrews and Perth Theatre, at the Tron Theatre, Glasgow in September 2004, prior to an extensive national tour.

Two plays from Moliere, by 'Scotland's greatest living dramatist' (Scotland on Sunday). Miseryguts is a Scots version of Moliere's Le Misanthrope, a bitter comedy about a worldly sophisticate who cannot help telling uncomfortable truths about his fellow men - and women, with one of whom, despite himself, he is deeply and painfully in love. In this Scots version of Moliere's play, Liz Lochhead transposes the action of the play into the world of media and politics in 21st-century, devolved Scotland, allowing for a rich seam of contemporary satire. Miseryguts was first performed in March 2002 at the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh. Tartuffe is a rollicking Scots version of Moliere's comic masterpiece. Lochhead brings out Moliere's mix of political satire and black comedy as the religious hypocrite, Tartuffe, worms his way into Orgon's household. Liz Lochhead's version is written in a robust Scots dialect, while retaining the rhyming couplet form of the French original. It was first performed in January 1986 at the Royal Lyceum Theatre, Edinburgh.

'Why do folk not, ever, catch on to themselves?... Ach, gies you another interesting nutter to play.' Welcome to Paris at the time of Louis XIV. Come backstage and meet the King's theatre company - a troupe of grandes dames, old hams, ingenues and, of course, their leading man, author of their dramas and cause of all their troubles... thon man Moliere. Under constant threat of debtors' prison, in big bother with church and state and - worst of all - disastrously in love, Moliere writes brilliant, scurrilous comedies inspired by a desperate life. But telling the truth is a dangerous business and his latest drama could be the death of him... Liz Lochhead's play Thon Man Moliere was first performed at the Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh in 2016, in a production starring Jimmy Chisholm and Siobhan Redmond. 'I was so moved by this play, which surprised me, as I had expected a knockabout comedy. Don't get me wrong, it was funny. But I hadn't expected the tenderness and emotional complexity. The bond - eternal, exasperated, essential - between Moliere and Madeleine is the core of the piece, but all of these characters seem every bit as human and deep and strange and needy as theatre people always are.' David Greig, Artistic Director of the Royal Lyceum, Edinburgh