  A highly stable diode-pumped circulation-free liquid dye laser in a vertical
external cavity is reported. The design is simple (no fabrication process step
required, no fluid circuitry), compact (~ cm sized), and cost-effective. An
optical efficiency of 18% with a M${}^2$ of 1 are reported, with an excellent
photostability-no efficiency drop was seen after 1.4 million pulses at 50 Hz, a
value comparable to flowing systems and much higher than values achievable with
organic solid-state lasers. We show that thermal effects are central in the
stability and also on the dynamics of this laser. The laser build-up and
shutdown dynamics are studied in detail for different pump pulse
durations/repetition rates; they reveal a pulse shortening with increasing pump
pulse duration and repetition rate that are shown to be due to thermal lensing
diffraction losses. This laser structure offers a very convenient and simple
platform for testing or harvesting solution-processable gain materials.
