 Cover of first edition | |
| Author | Simon Armitage |
|---|---|
| Genre | Poetry |
| Publisher | Faber and Faber |
Publication date | 1992 |
| Media type | Paperback |
| Awards | Forward Prize for Poetry |
| ISBN | 978-0571166077 |
| OCLC | 919570527 |
| Preceded by | Zoom! |
| Followed by | Book of Matches |
| Website | https://www.simonarmitage.com/kid/ |
Kid is the second collection of poems by Simon Armitage, published in 1992. The book won a Forward Prize for Poetry.
Simon Armitage is an English poet, playwright and novelist. He was appointed as Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom in 2019. [1] He is professor of poetry at the University of Leeds and became Oxford Professor of Poetry when he was elected to the four-year part-time appointment from 2015 to 2019. He was born and raised in Marsden, West Yorkshire. [2] [3] At the start of his career, and at the time Kid was published, he was working as a probation officer. [4]
Kid, Armitage's second book of poetry, [5] was his first to be published by Faber and Faber, in 1992. [6] [7]
The 48 poems in the collection, structured as a single list, include:
The collection was described by the poet and novelist Ruth Padel as being "Very Yorkshire; very Simon Armitage". [6] She wrote that the book "consolidated his name for technical virtuosity [and] black humour", [6] the voice having "a self-deprecatingly cocky self-centredness." [6] In her view, the first poem, "Brassneck", about a murderer, had "brilliant rhyme"; [6] but she noted that some, especially poets, "found it less convincing than Zoom!." [6]
The book won a Forward Prize for Poetry in the "best first collection" category in 1992, the first year in which the prizes were awarded. [9]
Sir Derek Alton Walcott was a Saint Lucian poet and playwright. He received the 1992 Nobel Prize in Literature. He was the University of Alberta's first distinguished scholar in residence, where he taught undergraduate and graduate writing courses. He also served as Professor of Poetry at the University of Essex from 2010 to 2013. His works include the Homeric epic poem Omeros (1990), which many critics view "as Walcott's major achievement." In addition to winning the Nobel Prize, Walcott received many literary awards over the course of his career, including an Obie Award in 1971 for his play Dream on Monkey Mountain, a MacArthur Foundation "genius" award, a Royal Society of Literature Award, the Queen's Medal for Poetry, the inaugural OCM Bocas Prize for Caribbean Literature, the 2010 T. S. Eliot Prize for his book of poetry White Egrets and the Griffin Trust For Excellence in Poetry Lifetime Recognition Award in 2015.
Seamus Justin Heaney was an Irish poet, playwright and translator. He received the 1995 Nobel Prize in Literature. Among his best-known works is Death of a Naturalist (1966), his first major published volume. Heaney was and is still recognised as one of the principal contributors to poetry in Ireland during his lifetime. American poet Robert Lowell described him as "the most important Irish poet since Yeats", and many others, including the academic John Sutherland, have said that he was "the greatest poet of our age". Robert Pinsky has stated that "with his wonderful gift of eye and ear Heaney has the gift of the story-teller." Upon his death in 2013, The Independent described him as "probably the best-known poet in the world".
Dame Carol Ann Duffy is a British poet and playwright. She is a professor of contemporary poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University, and was appointed Poet Laureate in May 2009, resigning in 2019. She is the first woman, the first Scottish-born poet and the first known LGBT poet to hold the position.
Simon Robert Armitage is an English poet, playwright and novelist who was appointed Poet Laureate on 10 May 2019. He is professor of poetry at the University of Leeds and succeeded Geoffrey Hill as Oxford Professor of Poetry when he was elected to the four-year part-time appointment from 2015 to 2019.
Sir Andrew Motion is an English poet, novelist, and biographer, who was Poet Laureate from 1999 to 2009. During the period of his laureateship, Motion founded the Poetry Archive, an online resource of poems and audio recordings of poets reading their own work. In 2012, he became President of the Campaign to Protect Rural England, taking over from Bill Bryson.
The Professor of Poetry is an academic appointment at the University of Oxford. The chair was created in 1708 by an endowment from the estate of Henry Birkhead. The professorship carries an obligation to lecture, but is in effect a part-time position, requiring only three lectures each year. In addition, every second year, the professor delivers the Creweian Oration, which offers formal thanks to benefactors of the university. Until 1968 this oration was delivered in Latin.
The T. S. Eliot Prize for Poetry is a prize that was, for many years, awarded by the Poetry Book Society (UK) to "the best collection of new verse in English first published in the UK or the Republic of Ireland" in any particular year. The Prize was inaugurated in 1993 in celebration of the Poetry Book Society's 40th birthday and in honour of its founding poet, T. S. Eliot. Since its inception, the prize money was donated by Eliot's widow, Mrs Valerie Eliot and more recently it has been given by the T S Eliot Estate. The T S Eliot Foundation took over the running of the T S Eliot Prize in 2016, appointing Chris Holifield, formerly director of the Poetry Book Society as its new director, when the former Poetry Book Society charity had to be wound up, with its book club and company name taken over by book sales agency Inpress Ltd in Newcastle. At present, the prize money is £20,000, with each of nine runners-up receiving £1500 each, making it the United Kingdom's most valuable annual poetry competition. The Prize has been called "the most coveted award in poetry".
Ruth Sophia Padel FRSL FZS is a British poet, novelist and non-fiction author, in whose work "the journey is the stepping stone to lyrical reflections on the human condition". She is known for her poetic explorations of migration, and of science; also for her involvement in music, wildlife conservation, and Greece, ancient and modern. She is Trustee for conservation charity New Networks for Nature and has served on the board of the Zoological Society of London. In 2013 she joined King's College London, where she is Professor of Poetry.
The Forward Prizes for Poetry are major British awards for poetry, presented annually at a public ceremony in London. They were founded in 1992 by William Sieghart with the aim of celebrating excellence in poetry and increasing its audience. The prizes do this by identifying and honouring talent: collections published in the UK and Ireland over the course of the previous year are eligible, as are single poems nominated by journal editors or prize organisers. Each year, works shortlisted for the prizes – plus those highly commended by the judges – are collected in the Forward Book of Poetry.
Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.
Sean O'Brien is a British poet, critic and playwright. His prizes include the Eric Gregory Award (1979), the Somerset Maugham Award (1984), the Cholmondeley Award (1988), the Forward Poetry Prize and the T. S. Eliot Prize (2007). He is one of only three poets to have won both the T. S. Eliot Prize and the Forward Poetry Prize for the same collection of poems. He grew up in Hull, and was educated at Hymers College and Selwyn College, Cambridge. He has lived in Newcastle upon Tyne since 1990, where he teaches at the university. He was the Weidenfeld Visiting Professor at St. Anne's College, Oxford for 2016-17.
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Book of Matches is a poetry book written by Simon Armitage, first published in 1993 by Faber and Faber. It was admired by critics and has been used in English literature examinations.
The National Poetry Competition is an annual poetry prize established in 1978 in the United Kingdom. It is run by the UK-based Poetry Society and accepts entries from all over the world, with over 10,000 poems being submitted to the competition each year. Winning has been an important milestone in the careers of many well-known poets.
Ian Gregson is an English novelist and poet. His debut poetry collection Call Centre Love Song was shortlisted for a Forward Prize in 2006. In 2015, he was put forward for the position of Professor of Poetry at Oxford University.
Poetry School is a national arts organisation, registered charity and adult education centre providing creative writing tuition, with teaching centres throughout England as well as online courses and downloadable activities. It was founded in 1997 by poets Mimi Khalvati, Jane Duran and Pascale Petit. Poetry School offers an accredited Master's degree in Writing Poetry, delivered in both London and Newcastle, in collaboration with Newcastle University. Online courses are delivered via CAMPUS, a social network dedicated to poetry.
Major poetry related events taking place worldwide during 2020 are outlined below under different sections. This includes poetry books released during the year in different languages, major literary awards, poetry festivals and events, besides anniversaries and deaths of renowned poets etc. Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.
Magnetic Field: The Marsden Poems is a 2020 collection of poems by the English poet Simon Armitage.
Walking Home: Travels with a Troubadour on the Pennine Way is a 2012 non-fiction book by the Yorkshire poet Simon Armitage. It chronicles his attempt to walk the long-distance trail the opposite way to that usually taken, from north to south. Along the way, he takes no money, stays with strangers, and gives poetry readings to pay his expenses. The book is illustrated with Armitage's photographs taken along the route. Two of his poems are included in the chapters about the places the poems describe.
Zoom! is a 1989 poetry collection by the British poet Simon Armitage, and his first full-length collection. It was selected as a Poetry Book Society Choice, shortlisted for the Whitbread Poetry Award, and was made the PBS Autumn choice.