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Gillian K. Ferguson
Gillian K. Ferguson (b.1965) is an award-winning Scottish poet and journalist, born and living in Edinburgh, Scotland. She is the creator of Air for Sleeping Fish (Bloodaxe, 1997) and the best-seller, Baby: Poems on Pregnancy, Birth and Babies (Canongate, 2001). She created a series of poems on the Human Genome Project called The Human Genome: Poems on the Book of Life, funded by a Creative Scotland Award of £25,000 in 2002. About her research, she said, "the Genome has remained fascinating throughout; a fantastic, beautiful poem - a magnificent work of Chemistry spanning four billion years of the art of Evolution." The project was praised by broadcaster, Andrew Marr of the BBC, and Francis Collins, Head of the US Human Genome Project.

She has won three writer's bursaries from the Scottish Arts Council (now The Scottish Book Trust). With one of these, she created her most recent work, Flora. Many of her poems can be read at PoetryZoo.com. In 2015, she suffered a severe stroke and writes while still in recovery.

Education
She holds an honours degree from the University of Edinburgh in Philosophy, specializing in Aesthetics and Metaphysics.

Work History
After graduation, she worked as a tutor for Open University, illustrator, and jewelry-maker. As a journalist, she wrote articles and reviews for The Scotsman. She also wrote features (Life and Opinion) for Scotland on Sunday, where she was editor of the youth edition of the paper. She worked at Save the Children Scotland as media consultant, as well as at other charities. She contributed to John Peel’s Radio 4, Home Truths, and a humorous feature to Financial Times Magazine. In 2012, she served as a judge in the Edwin Morgan International Poetry Competition. She has judged for the National Poetry Day Poems for Postcards Competition, in the Faber/Ottakars Poetry Competition, and the Creative Scotland Awards (2006).

Publications
Air for Sleeping Fish (Bloodaxe, 1997), shortlisted for the Scottish First Book of the Year award

Baby: Poems on Pregnancy, Birth and Babies (Canongate, UK; Grove Atlantic, US, 2001), the book is now published by GAP, available in BabyGAP

Anthologies
New Blood (Bloodaxe)

Faber Book of 20th Century Scottish Poems (Faber)

Dream States (Faber)

New Scottish Poets (Polygon)

Modern Scottish Women Poets; Edinburgh Book of 20th Century Scottish Poetry (Edinburgh University)

100 Favourite Scottish Poems (Luath/Scottish Poetry Library)

Awards
Daily Telegraph Arvon International Poetry Competition

Creative Scotland Award (2002)

The Scottish Arts Council (now The Scottish Book Trust) - three Writer’s Bursaries

Shortlisted, the Scottish First Book of the Year