Scottish poet and playwright Liz Lochhead was born in Motherwell in 1947. She studied at Glasgow School of Art and taught art at schools in Glasgow and Bristol. In 1971 Lochhead published her first collection of poems, ‘Memo for Spring’, which won a Scottish Arts Council Book Award. A female poet in a male-dominated field, her writings cross the boundaries of poetry, prose and drama. They are poignant and often humorous pieces that tell stories and question assumptions of female and Scottish identity. Often they also contain Gothic elements. In addition to poetry, she has written several theatrical pieces, the best-known being 'Mary Queen of Scots Got Her Head Chopped Off', which dramatises the history of Scotland from the female point of view.