Jackie Kay

Jackie Kay
Born	1961 (age 50–51) Edinburgh, Scotland
Alma mater	University of Stirling
Occupation	Professor of Creative Writing at Newcastle University
Known for	Poet and novelist

Jackie Kay MBE (born 1961) is a Scottish poet and novelist.

Biography

Jackie Kay was born in Glasgow in 1961 to a Scottish mother and a Nigerian father. She was adopted by a Scottish white couple Helen and John Kay and brought up in Bishopbriggs, a suburb of Glasgow.

Kay was brought up in a 1950s-built Glasgow housing estate in a small Wimpey house, which her adoptive parents had bought new in 1957. They adopted Kay in 1961 having already adopted Jackie's brother, Maxwell, about 2 years earlier. Jackie and Maxwell also have siblings who were brought up by the genetic parents. Kay's adoptive father worked for the Communist Party full-time and stood for Member of Parliament, and her adoptive mother was the Scottish secretary of Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament. In August 2007 Kay was the subject of the fourth episode of The House I Grew Up In, in which she talked about a happy childhood in a stimulating, albeit unconventional, home.

Initially harbouring ambitions to be an actress, she decided to concentrate on writing after Alasdair Gray, a Scottish artist and writer, read her poetry and told her that writing was what she should be doing. She studied English at the University of Stirling and her first book of poetry, the partially autobiographical The Adoption Papers, was published in 1991 and won the Saltire Society Scottish First Book Award. Her other awards include the 1994 Somerset Maugham Award for Other Lovers, and the Guardian First Book Award Fiction Prize for Trumpet, based on the life of American jazz musician Billy Tipton, born Dorothy Tipton, who lived as a man for the last fifty years of her life.

Kay writes extensively stage, screen and for children. In 2010 she published Red Dust Road, an account of her search for her birth parents, a white Scottish woman and a Nigerian man. Her birth parents had met when her father was a student at Aberdeen University and her mother was a nurse. Her drama The Lamplighter is an exploration of the Atlantic slave trade. It was broadcast on BBC Radio 3 in March 2007 and published in poem form in 2008.

Jackie Kay became a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) on 17 June 2006. She is currently Professor of Creative Writing at Newcastle University. Kay lives in Manchester.

She will also be partaking in the Bush Theatre's 2011 project Sixty Six where she has written a piece based upon a chapter of the King James Bible

Awards and honours

• 2011 Costa Book Awards (Poetry), shortlist, Fiere

Selected works

• The Adoption Papers (Poetry - 1991)
• Other Lovers (Poetry - 1993)
• Off Colour (Poetry - 1998)
• Trumpet (Fiction - 1998)
• The Frog who dreamed she was an Opera Singer (1998)
• Two's Company (1992)
• Why Don't You Stop Talking (Fiction - 2002)
• Strawgirl (2002)
• Life Mask (Poetry - 2005)
• Wish I Was Here (Fiction - 2006)
• The Lamplighter (2007)
• Red Cherry Red (2007)
• Darling (2007)
• Maw Broon Monologues (2009) (shortlisted for the Ted Hughes Award for New Work in Poetry)
• Red Dust Road (2010)
• Fiere (Poetry - 2011)

Some other poetry used in GCSE Edexcel Syllabus

• Brendon Gallacher
• Lucozade
• Yellow

See also

• Twice Through the Heart opera with libretto by Kay.

External links

• Transcript of interview with Ramona Koval, The Book Show, ABC Radio National, 4 September 2008, recorded at Edinburgh International Book Festival 2008
• Poetry Archive: Jackie Kay
• Biography, bibliography, prizes and awards, critical review and related links
• Streamed poetry read by Jackie Kay
• Bibliography, prizes and awards
• Guardian article (01/2002)
• Books From Scotland interview (12/2005)
• Free Verse interview (2002/01)
• Bold Type interview
• audio interview with Canadian Broadcasting Corp, 2006