Alastair Reid

Poet, essayist and translator, Alastair Reid was born in 1926 in Whithorn in Wigtownshire. After serving in the Royal Navy during WWII, he studied at St Andrews University. He was first published as a poet in 1951 with the New Yorker magazine, and has contributed many poets, reviews and reports for the magazine since then. A student of South American literature, he translated the works of authors such as Pablo Neruda and Jose Emilio Pacheco.

His own collections of poetry include Oasis, published in 1997, as well as earlier books such as Whereabouts, To Lighten My House and Weathering. He published over 40 books.

As a Professor of literature, he taught Latin American Literature in Spain, Switzerland, France, Greece, Morocco and across South America. Reid was actively involved in the Edinburgh International Book Festival and the Wigtown Book Town projects. He died in 2014.