Greig, Andrew

(1951- )

   The unofficial poet laureate of the mountaineering community, he was born in Bannockburn (two miles South of Stirling), Scotland, and grew up in Anstruther, Fife. He lives between his homes in Orkney and South Queensferry, Edinburgh. He was educated at the University of Edinburgh and is a former Glasgow University Writing Fellow and Scottish Arts Council Scottish/Canadian Exchange Fellow. Summit Fever: The Story of an Armchair Climber (1985) is an account of the successful ascent of the Mustagh Tower in the Himalayas by previously littleknown British climbers, of which he was one. His novel The Return of John McNab (1996) was short listed for the Romantic Novelists' Association Award and is being filmed for the BBC. His fifth novel, In Another Light (2004), won the 2004 Saltire Society Scottish Book of the Year Award. Some of his publications: White Boats, 1983. Men on Ice, 1977. Surviving Passages, 1982. The Order of the Day, 1990. Into You, 2001. Some of his poems: "In Galloway," "In the Tool-shed," "Interlude on Mustagh Tower," "Len's Poems," "The Glove," "The Maid and I," "Young Americans."

   Sources: A Book of Scottish Verse. Maurice Lindsay and R.L. Mackie, eds. St. Martin's Press, 1983. Poems of the Scottish Hills: An Anthology. Hamish Brown, ed. Aberdeen University Press, 1982. Poetry with an Edge. Neil Astley, ed. Bloodaxe Books, 1988. The Columbia Granger's Index to Poetry. 11th ed. The Columbia Granger's World of Poetry, Columbia University Press, 2005 (http://www.columbiagrangers.org).