Lemn Sissay and Befeqadu Hailu share 2019 PEN Pinter prize
British poet Sissay names persecuted Ethiopian writer and activist as this year’s ‘international writer of courage’The poet Lemn Sissay has won the PEN Pinter award alongside the Ethiopian writer...
View ArticlePoem of the month: The Poet
I am beginning to write in our language,but it is difficult.Only the elders speak our words,and they are forgetting.Continue reading...
View ArticleTime Lived, Without Its Flow by Denise Riley review – stunning clarity
A precise examination of parental grief and a rich Selected Poems from the poet philosopherIn 2008, the poet and philosopher Denise Riley’s adult son Jacob died suddenly from an undiagnosed heart...
View ArticlePoem of the week: Sonnets from Idea's Mirror by Michael Drayton
These Jacobean verses pay courtly tribute to the poet’s muse – and let rip on his critics31: To the CriticMethinks I see some crooked mimic jeer, And tax my Muse with this fantastic grace, Turning my...
View ArticleJohn Giorno – the New York radical who broke art and poetry's boundaries
Whether sleeping in a five-hour Warhol film, putting poetry over the phone or experimenting with augmented reality, the artist, who has died aged 82, refused to be confined by convention‘What do...
View ArticleHarold Bloom obituary
American literary critic and author who delighted in overturning orthodoxies“Criticism,” observed the literary critic Harold Bloom, who has died aged 89, “starts (it has to start) with a real passion...
View ArticleTS Eliot prize unveils shortlist of 'fearless poets'
Nominees for the £25,000 prize include Jay Bernard, Sharon Olds and Anthony AnaxagorouJay Bernard’s Surge, an exploration of the 1981 New Cross fire in south London that killed 13 young black people,...
View ArticleKathleen Jamie: 'Nature writing has been colonised by white men'
The genre’s current boom is dominated by middle-class males, she says, but the author of Surfacing prefers to concentrate on ‘deep time’Kathleen Jamie recently spent “valuable minutes” of her life...
View ArticleBernardine Evaristo: 'These are unprecedented times for black female writers'
The first black woman to win the Booker prize argues that a revolution is sweeping through British publishing. But can it lead to lasting change?Chidera Eggerue, AKA The Slumflower, is a social media...
View Article'All the hood rats would jam with us': Grandmaster Flash, AJ Tracey and other...
What difference does a decade or two make in the worlds of music, kids’ TV and poetry?Grandmaster Flash – born Joseph Saddler on New Year’s Day, 1958 – is often credited as one of the pioneers of...
View ArticleHarold Bloom’s defence of western greats blinded him to other cultures |...
The critic, who died last week, polarised opinionThere are good ways of being old-fashioned and there are bad. One may seek to preserve important practices or ways of thinking in the face of fashion....
View ArticleFiona Benson wins Forward prize with Greek myth poems for #MeToo age
Poems on grieving through Super Mario, ‘honour’ killings and sexual violence claim top awardsFiona Benson’s second collection, Vertigo & Ghost, has won the prestigious £10,000 Forward prize for...
View ArticleThe history of the book, from Gilgamesh to now – books podcast
This week, Richard Lea sits down with Tom Mole, professor of English literature and book history at the University of Edinburgh and director of the Centre for the History of the Book. In his new work,...
View ArticleForward prize winner Fiona Benson: ‘It’s still taboo to talk about rape and...
The poet, who wrote her winning collection in almost a single sitting, talks about motherhood, sexual violence and using poetry to process traumaFiona Benson’s second volume of poems, Vertigo &...
View ArticleThe Guardian view on the healthy state of poetry: a reprimand to Trump and...
English-language poetry is in great health – and has much to tell us about our fragile, fraught timesIn 2014, the chair of the judges of the Forward prizes for poetry, broadcaster Jeremy Paxman, said:...
View ArticleAncient graves give up secrets on Halloween
Michael Rosen will give a poet’s take on prehistoric burial items, including the Folkton drums, at the British MuseumThree are chalk cylinders, buried with a six-year-old child. Four are shiny gold...
View ArticleThe Mizzy by Paul Farley review – soaring and stirring
This avian-themed collection – mixed with stories of hangovers and red carpets – is witty, insightful and fabulously bizarreYou can never predict how – or where – a Paul Farley poem is going to land....
View ArticlePoem of the week: Hanging out with musicians … by Tom Sastry
A conventional young man’s encounter with a countercultural hero is sweetly funnyHe said fucking and that was important:“We’re all fucking broken.”He said it gentlylike a priest, soothing the smart of...
View ArticleOne language dies every two weeks. How can poetry help? – books podcast
On this week’s show, we look at endangered languages around the world and how poets and publishers are fighting to keep them alive. Sian sits down with Chris McCabe from the National Poetry Library,...
View ArticleDickinson review – Emily Dickinson reborn as a Lizzo-loving feminist
A half-baked comedy series rewrites the life of the American poet as a defiant feminist who ignores chores and delivers clunky dialogueEmily Dickinson doesn’t seem like the historical figure most ripe...
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