Dreaming Frankenstein

‘Human relationships, especially as seen from a woman’s point of view, are central: attraction, pain, acceptance, loss, triumphs and deceptions, habits and surprises; always made immediate through a storyteller’s concrete detail of place or voice or object or colour remembered or imagined.’ – Edwin Morgan

‘Dreaming Frankenstein is a rare thing: a book of poems which sparkles.’ – The Scotsman

‘. . . one of the few poets writing today capable of encompassing the matter of contemporary life in terms that are both attractive and thought-provoking.’ – Books in Scotland

Liz Lochhead has built an impressive reputation as poet, playwright and performer, attracting a large and admiring public. Dreaming Frankenstein and Collected Poems stands as a monument to her early work. Four collections - Memo for Spring (1972), Islands (1978) and Grimm Sisters (1981) and the title volume together provide a complete record of her poetry from 1967 to 1984.

In Dreaming Frankenstein human relationships, especially as seen from a woman’s point of view, are central. Attraction, pain, acceptance, loss, triumphs and deceptions are all made immediate through her imagery and acute powers of observation and through her flair as a storyteller.

    

Liz Lochhead is regarded as one of Scotland’s most popular poets and dramatists, born in Motherwell in Lanarkshire on 26 December 1947. Her poetry is characterised by a self-conscious effort to mimic the idioms of speech, adopting a range of spoken styles that include the lyrical use of cliché, rap, colloquialism and even advertising language in an effort to raise the profile of the marginalised voices of both Scots and women. Her most famous poetry collections include Dreaming Frankenstein and Collected Poems (1984), True Confessions and New Clichés (1985), and Bagpipe Muzak (1991). Her latest work, The Colour of Black and White: Poems 1984-2003 was published by Polygon in 2003.