GRANT D. MCLEMAN

Born in Glasgow in 1952 and now living on the Clyde Coast, Grant McLeman started writing in the 1970s. He was published in some anthologies and won three diplomas in the Scottish Open Poetry Competition. He then stopped writing virtually completely. There followed a period in which Grant concentrated on a number of activities including obtaining his B.A. Degree.
A chance meeting with jazz saxophonist Tommy Smith however, changed things on the creative front.......

In 2002 he was encouraged to resume writing after Scottish 'Poet Laureate' Edwin Morgan who was involved in several projects with Tommy Smith, read and appraised some of his work. This would lead to a collaboration with renowned U.S. photographer Martin Lueders resulting in them producing broadcast pieces throughout 2003 for the U.S. cable T.V. programme Coffee House. He has since been connected with the Limerick based Whitehouse Poetry Society with whom he has read (as guest poet) and has had a 'poem of the week' published on-line. The Whitehouse poets publish a poetry journal called 'Revival' and Grant has been published in five issues. He is now a regular attender at Cuisle, the Limerick International Poetry Festival where he performs 'open mic'. He is also published in the Autumn/Winter 2006 edition of the Californian magazine 'Monterey Poetry Review'.
In addition he has a number of poems available in several issues of the on-line and print magazine 'Four Volts' (now named 'Neon Literary Magazine') and in the Spring edition of the on-line 'MindFire Renewed'. Links to both these publications are available on this site.
He has also been invited to read at Bob Holman's Bowery Poetry Club in New York and is a member of the St. Mark's Poetry Project in the same city.
2007 and 2008 saw some of his work showcased on Laura Hird's literary site (www.laurahird.com) where he now has 11 poems on view , some more poetry published by FourVolts and another appearance in 'Revival'. He also teamed up with Chicago photographer Lloyd DeGrane to produce a piece for broadcast on 'Coffee House'. This was a welcome return to the T.V programme after 5 years.
Some of his poetry has been translated into Persian (Farsi) and Spanish by the poet/academic Saeid Hooshangi and will shortly be available on Dr Hooshangi's site and elsewhere.
Grant is in contact with the Paris based Irish poet and translator Derry O'Sullivan and is pleased to exchange views on poetry with him.
Currently, Grant and Egyptian poet friend Maysa Abdel Aal Ibrahim, a professor at the University of Alexandria and former pupil of Irish poet Desmond O'Grady ( whom Grant knows well from his trips to Limerick), are discussing working together on a poetry project. There may also be some Arabic translations of his poetry in the pipeline.
Always on the lookout for different expressions of his work and different challenges, Grant has been working with composer/songwriters Liam McFadden whose site can be found at www.myspace.com/liammcfadden and Steffen Offermann who's at www.stoman.de. Liam and Grant have produced their first song based on one of Grant's poems and have also collaborated on some poetry/music pieces.Steffen and Grant's first two songs can be found at www.soundclick.com with vocals by Domenic Mercurio ('Mimmo') and Tricia Dovidio respectively. They are working on a third song based on Grant's poetry.
Finally, he has recently published his first collection of poetry. It is called 'Street Magic' and its genesis owes much to the assistance of Robert Bagg, American poet and translator of (particularly) Euripides and Sophokles.

The photo above is of Grant reading at the Whitehouse Pub in Limerick.