We are delighted to announce the opening of this year’s McCash Scots Language Poetry Prize. Run jointly by The Herald and Glasgow University, this is a co-operative initiative that has been running successfully since the early 2000s and is the premiere Scots poetry prize.

This year, the generous awards from the University’s McCash bequest will be three prizes of £200 and seven of £150, distributed according to the merit of the poems in the judges’ view. This year, instead of suggesting a specific theme, we have decided to provide a selection of seven quotations which we think might prompt a poem or two in response. Just select one or two or even three from the following lines by Robert Burns and take them as inspirations for an original poem of your own, in the Scots language.

Inspirational quotations

‘O wert thou in the cauld blast…I’d shelter thee’

‘Oh wad some Pow’r the giftie gie us / To see oursels as others see us’

‘Kings may be blest, but Tam was glorious’

‘Now westlin winds, and slaught’ring guns’

‘But pleasures are like poppies spread, / You seize the flower, its bloom is shed’

‘Man’s inhumanity to Man / Makes countless thousands mourn!’

‘Still, thou art blest, compared wi’ me! / The present only toucheth thee’

Choose from one to three of these quotations to take off from, to dwell upon, and to be inspired by, and write your own poem going in whatever direction you like.

All forms of the Scots language will be considered, from urban city Scots to the voices of the Shetland or Orcadian archipelagos, from “synthetic” literary Scots to speech-based “native” Scots, from the patter of patois to the artifice of the learned and scholarly. Up to three submissions of original poems will be welcome.

The judges’ decisions are final. As well as Lesley Duncan, Poetry Editor at The Herald, and Alan Riach, Professor of Scottish Literature at Glasgow University, the third judge will be poet, makar, champion of the Scots language, and recent recipient of the Saltire Society’s Andrew Fletcher of Saltoun award, Rab Wilson, who writes as follows: “Gin ye are an established Makar in Scots, or a keen rhymer scrievin awa at hame, this is yer chaunce tae win a puckle o siller an see yer poetry published an receive national recognition! The McCash hus bin fir a lang time the benchmark an springboard that hus led tae mony a makar becomin a recognised household name oan the Scottish poetry scene. This year it micht be you! Sae dinnae be blate! Submit yer best wark an hae a go!”

How to submit your poems

Please write your name, address and email contact details on the reverse side of hard copy paper submissions (printouts welcome) of up to three unpublished, original manuscripts of poems in Scots not more than thirty lines long, and post them to Alan Riach, Scottish Literature, 7 University Gardens, Glasgow University, G12 8QB, to arrive on or before August 31.

Or email your entries to Lesley Duncan: ebs.duncan@gmail.com

We’re looking forward to reading them.

Happy writing, douce scrievers!