Tracey Herd (born 1968) is a Scottish poet based in

Dundee Dundee (; sco, Dundee; gd, Dùn Dè or ) is Scotland's fourth-largest city and the 51st-most-populous built-up area in the United Kingdom. The mid-year population estimate for 2016 was , giving Dundee a population density of 2,478/km2 or ...

Education

Herd graduated from the

University of Dundee The University of Dundee; . Abbreviated as ''Dund.'' for post-nominals. is a public university, public research university based in Dundee, Scotland. It was founded as a University college#United Kingdom, university college in 1881 with a donation ...

in English and American Studies in 1991.

Career

Herd's early works were published in anthologies such as ''New Women Poets'' (

Bloodaxe Books Bloodaxe Books is a British publishing house specializing in poetry. History Bloodaxe Books was founded in 1978 in Newcastle upon Tyne by Neil Astley, who is still editor and managing director. Bloodaxe moved its editorial office to Northumbe ...

, 1990), ''Eric, Gairfish (Duende: A Dundee Anthology,'' 1991''), The Gregory Anthology 1991-1993,'' (Sinclair-Stevenson, 1993). After winning the Eric Gregory Award in 1993 and a Scottish Arts Council Bursary in 1995 Herd published her debut collection ''No Hiding Place'' (Bloodaxe, 1995) which was subsequently shortlisted for the Forward Prize's Best First Collection. Herd's second collection, ''Dead Redhead'' (Bloodaxe Books, 2001) was published during her residency as a Creative Writing Fellow at Dundee University. In 2002 Herd's collaboration with Scottish composer Gordon McPherson saw the production of a short opera titled ''Descent,'' performed by the Paragon Ensemble'','' which ran at Edinburgh's

Traverse Theatre The Traverse Theatre is a theatre in Edinburgh, Scotland. It was founded in 1963 by John Calder, John Malcolm, Jim Haynes and Richard Demarco. The Traverse Theatre company commissions and develops new plays or adaptations from contemporary pla ...

. Her third published collection, ''Not In This World'' (Bloodaxe Books, 2015), was shortlisted for the

T. S. Eliot Prize The T. S. Eliot Prize for Poetry is a prize that was, for many years, awarded by the Poetry Book Society (UK) to "the best collection of new verse in English first published in the UK or the Republic of Ireland" in any particular year. The Priz ...

. From 2009 to 2011 Herd was a

Royal Literary Fund The Royal Literary Fund (RLF) is a benevolent fund that gives assistance to published British writers in financial difficulties. Founded in 1790, and granted a royal charter in 1818, the Fund has helped an extensive roll of authors through its long ...

Fellow at Dundee University and currently is a Royal Literary Fund Lector. One of Herd's great passions is horse-racing. Her first poem was published in Pacemaker, a horse-breeding magazine and she "has written online appreciations and obituaries of horses she admires." As a result of this passion she was invited in 2001 to read at

Musselburgh Racecourse Musselburgh Racecourse is a horse racing venue located in the Millhill area of Musselburgh, East Lothian, Scotland, UK, close to the River Esk. It is the second biggest racecourse in Scotland (the first being Ayr) and is the fourteenth bigges ...

Style

Don Paterson Donald Paterson (born 1963) is a Scottish poet, writer and musician. Background Don Paterson was born in Dundee, Scotland, in 1963. He won an Eric Gregory Award in 1990 and his poem "A Private Bottling" won the Arvon Foundation International ...

has described Herd's subject matter as "innocently domestic" becoming "darkly sexual" and John Kinsella promotes her work as "risky and challenging". ''Not In This World'' is a collection on "love and friendship...joy, grief and loss."

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Herd, Tracey 1968 births Scottish women poets Living people Alumni of the University of Dundee