First published in 2010 to mark the centenary of Norman Mac Caig’s birth, The Many Days aims to strike a balance between representing the much-loved poems that any reader would expect to find in a selected Mac Caig, and other less familiar verses.
The collection is arranged 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 Mac Caig returns us to that good place we know as the world, but hardly ever seen so clearly as we do in these marvellous poems.
Circa l’autore
Roderick Watson was born in Aberdeen and educated at Aberdeen Grammar School, Aberdeen University and Peterhouse, Cambridge. A recently retired professor at Stirling University, he has lectured and published widely on modern Scottish literature and currently co-edits the Journal of Stevenson Studies. His main poetry collections are True History on the Walls (1977) and Into the Blue Wavelengths (2004).