Four-year-old lands book deal for his 'astonishing' poetry

Nadim Shamma-Sourgen’s words, evoking a ‘whole world full of hugs’, were spotted by the writer Kate Clanchy and will be published next summer

Keats’s first book of poetry was published when he was 21; Mary Shelley was 18 when she started writing Frankenstein. But both of their youthful achievements are dwarfed by the newest star in the UK’s poetry firmament: four-year-old Nadim Shamma-Sourgen, who has just landed a book deal.

Nadim’s poems range from Coming Home (“Take our gloves off / Take our shoes off / Put them where they’re supposed to go. / You take off your brave feeling / Because there’s nothing / to be scared of in the house”), to Love (“Everyone has love / Even baddies”).