As part of the Edwin Morgan Trust’s commitment to support writers from under-represented* Scottish identities, The Second Life Awards provides two bursaries for poets over 30 to receive individual support from Moniack Mhor. This may take the form of courses, retreat or mentoring and is designed in conversation with the recipient.
In 2022 and 2023, Scottish BPOC Network and Sanctuary Queer Arts were each asked to each nominate a number poets that they feel would benefit from this opportunity, and the final recipients are selected by a panel.
* This could include people who experience racism, those who are disabled and/or neurodivergent, folk who are trans, non-binary and/or queer, and people from working class/lower socio-economic backgrounds as well as people who experience other underrepresented and oppressed identities.
The 2023 Edwin Morgan Trust X Moniack Mhor Award Recipients
Mae Diansangu is a queer poet and spoken word artist from Aberdeen. She has performed at literary festivals across Scotland and appeared on BBC Scotland’s Big Scottish Book Club and BBC Radio 4’s Tongue and Talk. Her series of poems “black lives, heavy truths” is part of the National Library of Scotland’s collection. You can read her work in the anthologies “Tales fae the Doric Side” and “Re creation – a queer poetry anthology”. Mae writes in both English and Doric, and her first collection BLOODSONGS (Tapsalteerie) will be published in Autumn 2024.
Raman Mundair is an Indian born, director, writer, artist, activist, filmmaker and playwright. She is not neuro-typical and identifies as disabled, Queer and a British Asian intersectional feminist. She is based in Shetland and Glasgow. She is the award winning author of Lovers, Liars, Conjurers and Thieves, A Choreographer’s Cartography, The Algebra of Freedom (a play) and is the editor of Incoming: Some Shetland Voices.