Richie McCaffery is originally from Warkworth in Northumberland but lived, worked and studied in Scotland for a decade where he completed a PhD in Scottish Literature at the University of Glasgow (his thesis was on the Scottish poets of World War Two). He was resident in Ghent, Belgium between 2015 and 2018.
McCaffery is a critic and reviewer, and his essays, largely on Scottish poetry of the second half of the twentieth century, have appeared in The Scottish Literary Review, The Dark Horse, Northwords Now, Fras and Etudes ecossaises.
His poetry has appeared in numerous journals, e-zines and anthologies, such as Salt’s Best British Poetry 2012. The pamphlet Ballast Flint is a collaboration with the artist Hannah Rye and is a product of his time as writer-in-residence for the Cromarty Arts Trust during their Sir Thomas Urquhart symposium in 2011. It was the runner-up in the 2014 Callum Macdonald Pamphlet Award. His first full collection Cairn appeared from Nine Arches Press in 2014, and the second, Passport, in 2018.
McCaffery was one of the writers in residence for the Biggar Trust at Hugh MacDiarmid’s Brownsbank cottage. He was a Hawthornden fellow in October 2011; recipient of a 2009 Edwin Morgan Travel Bursary; has been twice shortlisted for a Scottish Book Trust New Writer’s Award and twice for the Eric Gregory Awards.