Richard Watt

Richard Watt or Richard Stephen Watt (born March 5th 1982) is a prize-winning Scottish writer best known for his acerbic anti-romantic prose and often spectacularly far-fetched poetry. He has been shortlisted for two of 2009's top bursaries for Scottish fiction, and is currently completing his first mature book of poetry "The New Stone Age". He has completed an honours degree in Philosophy at the University of Dundee, and worked as a barman, banker, shelf-stacker, clerk and editor.

Early Life & Career
Richard was born in Forfar, on the East Coast of Scotland. He started writing in the 1990's after being selected to have early folio works published in a local newspaper, the Forfar Dispatch. On moving to Dundee to begin a Masters in English Literature (later switching to Philosophy) he enjoyed some success in local student papers such as Eric and Contact. In 2004, Richard's juvenile poem Lungless Boy won the Dundee University open poetry prize.

Publishing Record & Current Projects
Richard's publishing credits include Fuselit, Obsessed with Pipework, The Frogmore Papers, New Writing: Dundee, Gold Dust, Riverrun. At the launch of New Writing: Dundee he gave a reading of two pieces from his forthcoming collection the New Stone Age ; the Golem and Stobswell Set Radio Future. Other authors at the four day event included Philip Pullman, Ian Rankin, Peter Hobbs, Ben Markovits, Bill Duncan and Christopher Priest. Despite Watt being seen as a proponent of the New Diaspora in Scottish literature, Stobswell Set... issued a warning to perceived back-patting and clique mentality among writers groups.

Future Projects
Richard's first collection of poetry the New Stone Age is slated for a Spring 2009 release by Unreasonable Press. His time-travel suicide novel Why Be Blue? is under consideration for the Dundee Book Prize 2009. Rimbaud intae Scots, a joint project to translate Arthur Rimbaud's known poetry into Lowland Scots, or Lallans, is intended for completion in 2010.