Constabal Murdo 2

Tha Aonghas Pàdraig Caimbeul air iomadach duais a chosnadh mar bhàrd, nobhailiche, neach-naidheachd, craoladair agus cleasaiche. Buinidh e do dh’Uibhist-a-Deas far an deach a thogail gus an do ghluais a theaghlach a-mach gu sgìre an Òbain nuair a bha e 13. Chaidh e dhan Àrd Sgoil an sin, far an robh Iain Crichton Mac a’ Ghobhainn ga theagasg. Cheumnaich e le Àrd Urram ann am Poileataics agus Eachdraidh o Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann, agus tha e air a bhith ag obrachadh anns na meadhanan on uair sin. Ann an 2011 chaidh Crùn na Bàrdachd a thoirt dha. Ann an 2002 choisinn e Duais Chruthachail na h-Alba agus ann an 2008 chaidh ainmeachadh airson BAFTA son an Cleasaiche as fhèarr son na rinn e anns am film Seachd. Chaidh an nobhail Gàidhlig aige, ‘An Oidhche Mus do Sheòl Sinn’ a bhòtadh a-steach leis a’ phoball dhan Phrìomh Dheich anns a’ chlàr airson na 100 leabhraichean a b’ fhèarr a chaidh riamh a dhèanamh an Alba. Sgrìobh Somhairle MacGill-Eain seo mu dheidhinn – “Chan eil teagamh sam bith agam nach e Aonghas Pàdraig Caimbeul fear de na bàird as fhèarr a th’againn ann an Alba, ann an cànan sam bith.”

ANGUS PETER CAMPBELL is a native of the Island of South Uist in the Outer Hebrides and was brought up there and on the Island of Seil in Argyll. He attended Oban High School where his English teacher was Iain Crichton Smith, then graduated with Honours in History and Politics from the University of Edinburgh, under the guidance of the great Marxist teacher Professor Richard Ashcraft from the UCLA who was a Visiting Fellow at the time.

His writing has won many awards over the years, including the premier Bardic Crown from the leading Gaelic organisation, An Comunn Gàidhealach. His Gaelic novel An Oidhche Mus do Sheòl Sinn was voted by the public into the Top Ten of the Best-Ever novels from Scotland. His poetry collection The Greatest Gift was reviewed as a masterpiece by Sorley MacLean, his poetry collection Aibisidh won the Scottish Poetry Book of the Year Award in 2012, and his novel Memory and Straw the Scottish Fiction Book of the Year Award in 2017. The writer, academic and singer Dr Anne Lorne Gillies has described him as ‘an international literary figure alongside the likes of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Toni Morrison and Laura Esquivel’.