Edwin Morgan (1920–2010): Glasgow's Poet and Scotland's First Makar

Each major claim carries one of three labels. established means supported by primary records, official bodies or several independent reliable sources. shared means the core fact is sound but sources disagree on details, dates or interpretation. traditional means widely repeated but not traceable to a primary or independent source.

Morgan is well documented in his own work, interviews and James McGonigal's authorised biography. Some details of his private life became public only late or after his death, and are reported here as they were reported then.

Glasgow and the war

established Edwin George Morgan was born in Glasgow on 27 April 1920, the only child of a middle-class Presbyterian family. He began studying English at the University of Glasgow in 1937, but his studies were interrupted by the Second World War. A conscientious objector at first, he served with the Royal Army Medical Corps in Egypt, Lebanon and Palestine. He returned to the university, graduated in 1947 and taught there for more than thirty years, becoming Professor of English in 1975 and retiring in 1980.

A poet of everything

established Morgan published 25 collections of poetry. His range was extraordinary. He wrote concrete and sound poems, such as "The Loch Ness Monster's Song", made entirely of invented noises, and "The Computer's First Christmas Card", in which a machine stumbles towards "Merry Christmas". He wrote science-fiction poems of space travel, Glasgow poems of tenements, buses and snack bars, and tender love poems such as "Strawberries". His breakthrough collection, The Second Life (1968), celebrated a changing Glasgow and his own late flowering as a poet. Sonnets from Scotland (1984), written after the failed 1979 devolution referendum, imagined Scotland across geological and future time.

established He was also a major translator, of Beowulf (1952), of the Russian futurist Mayakovsky, of Hungarian and Italian poets, and of Rostand's Cyrano de Bergerac into vigorous Glaswegian Scots for the stage. He supported and inspired a generation of Scottish writers, including Alasdair Gray, Liz Lochhead and Jackie Kay.

Poet Laureate and Makar

established In 1999 Morgan became Glasgow's first Poet Laureate, and in 2004 the Scottish Executive named him Scotland's first Makar, the national poet, a post revived from the medieval title for court poets. In October 2004 his poem "Open the Doors!", written for the opening of the new Scottish Parliament building at Holyrood, was read at the ceremony by Liz Lochhead because Morgan was too ill to attend. It urged the new parliament to be open to the people and their voices.

Coming out

established Morgan was gay, at a time when homosexuality was illegal in Scotland until 1980. Many of his love poems were written about men but kept their subjects' gender ambiguous. In 1990, at seventy, he came out publicly in an interview. His love poems and his openness about gay life are credited with helping change social attitudes in Scotland.

Death and legacy

established Morgan spent his last years in a care home in Glasgow and died on 19 August 2010, aged 90. A lifelong supporter of independence, he left a large bequest to the Scottish National Party. The Edwin Morgan Trust awards the Edwin Morgan Poetry Award to young Scottish poets, and his collected work remains in print.

• "The Loch Ness Monster's Song" contains no real words at all.
• Morgan translated Cyrano de Bergerac into Glaswegian Scots.
• He served as a medical orderly in the Middle East in the Second World War.
• He was the first person to hold the modern title of Makar.
• He was too ill to attend the opening of the Parliament building he wrote a poem for.
• He came out publicly as gay at seventy.

• Myth: Morgan was a poet who wrote mainly in Scots. Most of his work is in English. He did write and translate in Scots, notably his Glaswegian version of Cyrano de Bergerac.
• Myth: Morgan read "Open the Doors!" at the opening of the Scottish Parliament. He was too ill to attend, and Liz Lochhead read the poem for him.
• Myth: The Makar post has run continuously since the Middle Ages. It was revived from the medieval title for court poets, and Morgan was the first holder of the modern post in 2004.