Awards
Here is a selection of some recognition that I have received; I regard my work as a poet on an equal footing to my public roles where I help diversify literature
2025
- Royal Society of Literature in January, completed four-year term as Chair
2024
- Honorary Fellow of the English Association
2023
- indiom: Poetry Book Society Choice, The Guardian’s Poetry Book of the Year
- Patron Stephen Spender Trust
- indiom (pub Faber & Faber) Selected a Poetry Book Society Choice for Autumn
2022
- QAA Benchmark for English
- Honorary Fellow, Homerton College, University of Cambridge
2021
- National REF Panel 27
- Chair of the Royal Society of Literature
- Council Society of Authors
- Lead Advisor Poetry By Heart
2018
- Elected to the Council of the Royal Society of Literature
- Winner of the Cholmondeley Award
2017
- Elected Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature
2016
- Selected as a Trustee of the Arvon Foundation
2014
- Winner of the Royal Society of Arts’ Travelling Scholarship
- Selected as a New Generation Poet by the Poetry Book Society
- Shortlisted for the TS Eliot Prize
2012
- Shortlisted for the TS Eliot Prize
2008
- Arts Council Grant for the Arts
- Won The South Bank Show Decibel Prize
2007
- Costa Poetry prize nomination
- Won the Forward Prize for Best First Collection
- Shortlisted for the Guardian First Book Award
- Shortlisted for the Glen Dimplex New Writers Award for Poetry
- Shortlisted for the Jerwood Aldeburgh First Collection Prize
2004
- Won the Forward Poetry Prize for Best Individual Poem
2003
- First ever Poetry Book Society Pamphlet Choice
- Oh My Rub! (Smith/Doorstop) Won the Poetry Pamphlet Competition
- Pamphlet selected as one of the Guardian Poetry Books of the year