ALAN RIACH is a poet and Head of the Department of Scottish Literature at the University of Glasgow. Formerly Associate Professor of English and Pro-Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences at the University of Waikato (New Zealand), he is the General Editor of the
Collected Works of Hugh MacDiarmid and co-editor of MacDiarmid's
New Selected Letters and
Selected Poems). He has four books of poems, including
Clearances,
First & Last Songs, and
This Folding Map. He has also broadcast on radio in New Zealand, and lives in Scotland.