Poet, songwriter, film maker, critic, editor, teacher and translator, Donny O’Rourke was born, brought up and educated in Renfrewshire and has degrees from the University of Glasgow and from Cambridge. After holding senior senior positions in television and journalism, Donny went freelance. He still broadcasts regularly and is the author or editor of more than a dozen books, CDs and works for the theatre including translations, mostly from French. He edited the landmark anthology Dream State: the New Scottish Poets, first published in 1994, and has since edited several other anthologies. Fellowships, residencies and visiting professorships have enabled him to write and teach overseas. His most recent commission was a suite of texts inscribed in the new Maryhill Health Centre in Glasgow.
His poetry collections include The Waistband and other poems (Polygon, 1997) and On a Roll: a Jena notebook (Mariscat, 2001), and with Richard Price he published a pamphlet of versions of modern French lyrics, Eftirs/Afters (Au Quai, 1996). A dual language collection resulting from his time in Nuremberg was published in 2005: Aus dem Wartesaal der Poesie/From Poetry’s Waiting Room.
