in conversation with David Kinloch

David Kinloch is the author of Dustie-fute (Vennel Press, 1992) and Paris-Forfar (Polygon, 1994). His next full collection, Un Tour d'Ecosse is forthcoming from Carcanet. A founder, co-editor of Verse and a co-editor of Southfields, he teaches French at the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow. He has recently co-edited with Richard Price La Nouvelle Alliance: Influences francophones sur la littérature écossaise moderne (Grenoble, Ellug, 2000).

RICHARD PRICE: Could you say a little about your background - your education, sense of locality, growing up?

DAVID KINLOCH: I was born near Glasgow in 1959 and grew up in the Pollokshields area of the city. My mother was an infant teacher by profession and my father, a lawyer. Along with my younger brother and sister, I enjoyed a fairly prosperous, middle-class upbringing. I was very fond of my father who died in 1984 although I think we had a rather uneasy relationship. He was in many ways a larger than life character: a gifted amateur opera singer and actor who should probably have tried to develop those talents professionally. My mother also has a lot of artistic ability but in her case it takes the form of painting. My maternal grandmother played a significant role in my life right up to her death at the age of 92 in 1990. In her day she had been one of the first women in Scotland to lecture at a Scottish University in English Literature and was the widow ...