Stephen Scobie is known as a prolific Canadian poet (Governor General’s Award 1980) and critic (Prix Gabrielle Roy 1986). But he was born in Scotland, in 1943, and spent the first 21 years of his life there, before coming to Canada in 1965. In this new book, Replay (mainly poetry, part prose memoir), Scobie looks back at these early years as if at a series of images, a memory-recording which he can (always bearing in mind the fallibility of memory’s service) replay – and repay, and relay, and reply. The poems range widely over the personal – memories of his family, especially of his father, and of the tangled glories of several adolescent love affairs – and the public world – from a despotic namesake in post-War Greece to a sensational murder trial in 1950s Glasgow. What remains throughout is Scotland – the land itself, its history and culture – which the retrospect of 50 years has only brought into the sharper focus of this...

Replay.

Stephen Scobie is a Canadian poet, critic, and scholar. Born in Carnoustie, Scotland, Scobie relocated to Canada in 1965. He earned a PhD from the University of British Columbia in Vancouver after which he taught at the University of Alberta and at the University of Victoria. Scobie is a founding editor of Longspoon Press, an elected member of the Royal Society of Canada, and the recipient of the 1980 Governor General’s Award for McAlmon’s Chinese Opera (1980) and the 1986 Prix Gabrielle Roy for Canadian Criticism.