Alan Spence

(born 1947 - ) - Glasgow, now lives in Edinburgh

Alan Spence

Born in Glasgow in 1947, Alan Spence is an award-winning poet, novelist and playwright. His first poetry collection, Plop!, was published in 1970 and has since written several more collections. He is considered to be the leading Scottish haiku writer, with collections including Seasons of the Heart and Clear Light. Haiku and another Japanese poetry form, tanka, feature in his most recent novel, The Pure Land, which is set in 19th century Japan and tells the true story of Scotsman Thomas Blake Glover.

He has won a Scottish Arts Council Book award three times, was the SAC Scottish Writer of the Year in 1995, and in 2006 won the Glenfiddich Spirit of Scotland (Writing) Award in 2006. Alan Spence now lives in Edinburgh with his wife, where they run the Sri Chinmoy Meditation Centre. He is Chair of Creative Writing at the University of Aberdeen, and has been Artistic Director of the Aberdeen Word Festival since 1999.

  • Cover scan of Clear Light
    Add to Basket
    £7.99
    Clear Light: Haiku - Paperback
    'Clear Light' contains 150 haiku bursting with Alan Spence's characteristic verve and wit. Mythic and mesmerising, awestruck and hilarious, these poems shed clear light on the delights, hardships, breakthroughs and frustrations of the world of the momentary.
  • Cover scan of Glasgow Zen
    Add to Basket
    £7.99
    Glasgow Zen - Paperback
    Alan Spence's collection of haikus and other short poetic forms focuses on the theme of Glasgow, its people, landscape and culture. It includes some previously published poems but is mostly made up of contemporary writing.
  • Cover scan of The Magic Flute
    Add to Basket
    £5.24
    The Magic Flute - Paperback
    The Magic Flute is a funny, sharply observant novel, combining gritty realism with great humour & considerable poetry. Spence won the McVitie's Scottish Writer of the Year Prize in 1996. Previous novels include Way to Go & Its Colours They Are Fine.
  • Cover scan of The Pure Land
    Add to Basket
    £7.99
    The Pure Land - Paperback
    'The Pure Land' relives in fiction the arc of Thomas Glover's true-life rise and fall, and forges a hundred-year saga that culminates in the annihilation of Nagasaki in 1945. It spans the feudal and the atomic ages, east and west, global history and private passion.

Bibliography

  • Cover scan of Alan Spence's Its Colours They Are Fine, And, Way To Go

    £5.50
    Alan Spence's Its Colours They Are Fine, And, Way To Go - Paperback - John Burns
    The 'Scotsnotes' booklets are a series of study guides to major Scottish writers and texts frequently used within literature courses, aimed at senior secondary school pupils and students in further education. The individual authors are not only experts on a particular writer or text but also are experienced in teaching in schools.
Last modified Tuesday 07 September 2010
}