Tom Leonard

Tom Leonard was born in Glasgow on 22 August 1944 and died 21 December 2018. He began a degree course at Glasgow University in 1967, but didn’t complete it. He returned to the university in the 1970s and finished his degree in English and Scottish Literature.

Leonard joined a group of new and distinctive authors, including Philip Hobsbaum, Alasdair Gray, Liz Lochhead and James Kelman, With Gray and Kelman as colleagues he became Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Glasgow, from 2001 till 2009. He is best known for his poems written in Glaswegian dialect, especially his ‘Six Glasgow Poems’ and ‘The Six O'Clock News’.

His work dealt with language, class and culture and is best appreciated when read aloud in performance. His poems are notably expressive and humorous.