Thomas Clark (born 13 July 1980) is a Scottish poet and writer. He is best known for his work in

Scots language Scots ( endonym: ''Scots''; gd, Albais, ) is an Anglic language variety in the West Germanic language family, spoken in Scotland and parts of Ulster in the north of Ireland (where the local dialect is known as Ulster Scots). Most commonly ...

and his writing about

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

Scots language

A native speaker and Scots language specialist, Clark has published several books of translations, including a

Glaswegian The Glasgow dialect, popularly known as the Glasgow patter or Glaswegian, varies from Scottish English at one end of a bipolar linguistic continuum to the local dialect of West Central Scots at the other. Therefore, the speech of many Glaswegia ...

rendering of

Alice's Adventures in Wonderland ''Alice's Adventures in Wonderland'' (commonly ''Alice in Wonderland'') is an 1865 English novel by Lewis Carroll. It details the story of a young girl named Alice (Alice's Adventures in Wonderland), Alice who falls through a rabbit hole into a ...

and an award-winning Scots translation of

Diary of a Wimpy Kid ''Diary of a Wimpy Kid'' is an American children’s book series and media franchise created by author and cartoonist Jeff Kinney. The series follows Greg Heffley, a middle-schooler who illustrates his daily life in a diary (although he const ...

. In 2015, he released ''Intae the Snaw'', a collection of Scots translations which was praised by writer

Matthew Fitt Matthew Fitt (born 1968) is a Scots poet and novelist. He was writer-in-residence at Greater Pollok in Glasgow, then National Scots Language Development Officer. He has translated several literary works into Scots. Early life Fitt was born in 19 ...

as "Brilliant... Tammas Clark takes the bonnie broukit bairn that is the Scots and blaws new life intae the hail clamjamfrie" and by poet

Rab Wilson Rab Wilson (born 1 September 1960, in New Cumnock, Ayrshire) is a Scottish poet who writes mainly in the Scots language. His works include a Scots translation of the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, and the poetry books ''Accent o the Mind'', ''Life Sent ...

as "an important collection that timeously re-establishes the pouer, virr an smeddum o the Scots language!" In 2019, Clark won the first ever Scots Bairns' Book o the Year award at the inaugural Scots Language Awards. Previously editor of Scots at

Bella Caledonia ''Bella Caledonia'' is an online magazine publishing social, political and cultural commentary. It was launched in 2007 and came to particular prominence during the campaign period of the Scottish independence referendum that was held in 2014. Th ...

, Clark is now a regular columnist at The National. In 2021, he acted as co-translator on the Scots language version of the web browser

Firefox Mozilla Firefox, or simply Firefox, is a free and open-source web browser developed by the Mozilla Foundation and its subsidiary, the Mozilla Corporation. It uses the Gecko rendering engine to display web pages, which implements current and ...

Football writing

A former footballer, Clark was appointed Scottish football's first ever poet-in-residence in 2015, taking up a position with

Lowland League The Scottish Lowland Football League (SLFL, commonly known as the Lowland League) is a senior association football, football league based in central and southern Scotland. The league sits at level 5 on the Scottish football league system, actin ...

side

Selkirk F.C. Selkirk Football Club (nicknamed the Souters) was a Scottish football club based in the town of Selkirk. Founded in 1880, they were the oldest established football club in the Scottish Borders. The club was selected as a founder member of the ...

''Selkirk FC vs the World!'', a collection of pieces written by Clark about the club, was published in 2016. It was followed in 2017 by a comic novel following the misadventures of a former Selkirk midfielder, ''Your Pal Andy''. In 2016, Clark performed ''O Johnny Moscardini!'', his poem celebrating Scots-Italian footballer Giovanni Moscardini, ahead of the first ever Moscardini Cup football match in

Barga Barga may refer to: People * Barga Mongols in the early 20th century Places * Barga (department), Burkina Faso * Barga, Tuscany Barga is a medieval town and ''comune'' of the province of Lucca in Tuscany, central Italy. It is home to around 10, ...

Bibliography

* ''Alice's Adventirs in Wunnerlaun'' (2014) * ''Intae the Snaw'' (2015) * ''Selkirk FC vs the World!'' (2016) * ''Your Pal Andy'' (2017) * ''Diary o a Wimpy Wean'' (2018) * ''Peppa's Bonnie Unicorn'' (2019) * ''Diary o a Wimpy Wean: Rodrick the Radge'' (2020) * ''Diary o a Wimpy Wean: Up Tae The Oxters'' (2020) * ''A Series o Scunnersome Events: The Boggin Beginnin'' (2021) * '' Animal Fairm'' (2022)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Clark, Thomas 1980 births Living people 21st-century British male writers 21st-century British translators 21st-century Scottish poets Alumni of the University of Glasgow Alumni of the University of Strathclyde Association footballers not categorized by position Hawick Royal Albert F.C. players Lallans poets People educated at Hamilton Grammar School People from Hamilton, South Lanarkshire Scots-language writers Scottish columnists Scottish essayists Scottish footballers Scottish librarians Scottish novelists Scottish sportswriters Scottish translators Selkirk F.C. players