The Many Days

Published to mark the centenary of Norman MacCaig's birth, The Many Days aims to strike a balance between respecting the much-loved poems that any reader would expect to find a selected MacCaig, and other less familiar verses.

The collection is arrange to show the range of the poet's work in all its variety, from his love of nature and the landscape of the North West Highlands to his life in Edinburgh; from his care for animals and human friendship, to his moments of joy and grief, creative delight and occasional creative dread. Time and again MacCaig returns us to that good place we know was the world, but hardly ever see so clearly as we do in these marvellous poems.

'I have always loved the mixture of strictness and susceptibility in Norman MacCaig's work. It is an ongoing education the marvellous possibilities of lyric poetry.' Seamus Heaney

'I have read or re-read every poem [in the Collected poems], and I think it one of the greatest literary experiences of my life.' Sorley MacLean

'Whenever I meet his poems, I am always struck by their undated freshness; everything about them is alive, as new and essential, as ever.' Ted Hughes