Doric playwrights offered £1000 prize

FIT next? Aberdeen University and an Aberdeenshire-based drama group have united to offer a £1000 prize for a play written in Doric, the distinctive dialect of the North east of Scotland.

• Entries are being accepted for the Charles Barron Prize for Doric Drama

The prize is being offered to commemorate the life and work of Charles Barron, the North east playwright who died in April last year. It is being funded by the Department of English of the university and Fleeman Productions, a drama group specialises in the writing and performance of original Doric plays. It was founded in 2004 after the performance of “Toulmin”, an original play by Charles Barron about David Toulmin, the noted Doric writer of short stories.

A university spokeswoman said: “Entries are invited for the Charles Barron Prize for Doric Drama with a closing date for entries of 30 September. There will be a first prize of £1000 and two runner-up awards of £300 and £100. The prize-winning plays, and all entries for the competition, will be considered for performance by the group.

“Plays may be full-length or one-act, and should be written in one of the North east Doric dialects. Entries must be original and not previously published or performed.”

She added: “Doric, the dialect of North east Scotland, holds a special place in the Scottish family of languages. It was widely spoken in the farming and fishing communities, as well as in Aberdeen and the towns and villages of the North east and today still recognisably contributes to the region’s unique identity. It has a vibrant literary, oral and song tradition and has evolved in new ways as an expression of North east life in a multi-cultural context.”

The entries will be considered by a panel of judges including Alison Lumsden, Professor of Scottish Literature, Paul Dukes, Emeritus Professor of History, and Sheila Reid a North east-based poet and Doric actor. The winners will be announced in December .