UK Poet Laureate Simon Armitage was born and grew up in West Yorkshire, England. He is the recipient of numerous prizes and awards, including the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry and PEN Prize for Translation. He has published over a dozen poetry collections, including Magnetic Field: the Marsden Poems, and acclaimed medieval translations of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight and The Owl and the Nightingale. He also writes, records and performs with the band LYR and has received an Ivor Novello Award for his song writing. His recent book Never Good with Horses assembles his song lyrics for the first time. His new book Blossomise came out this Spring. He is also the author of two novels and three non-fiction bestsellers: All Points North, Walking Home and Walking Away. A regular broadcaster, Armitage presents the popular UK BBC Radio 4 series The Poet Laureate has Gone to his Shed. An award-winning dramatist, his play Hansel and Gretel: A Nightmare in Eight Scenes, was performed at Shakespeare’s Globe in London this winter. Armitage is Professor of Poetry at the University of Leeds. A Vertical Art brings together the vibrant and engaging lectures from his tenure as Oxford Professor of Poetry (2015-2019).
Simon Armitage
