18-Pressrelease-Thawinner Layout 1
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
PRESS RELEASE Strictly embargoed until 8.10pm 28 March 2018 Jay Bernard wins the Ted Hughes Award for New Work in Poetry for Surge: Side A Surge: Side A was praised by the judges for being “riveting... propelled by a strong internal momentum” Ted Hughes Award judges Gillian Allnutt, Lemn Sissay and Sally Beamish have chosen Jay Bernard’s Surge: Side A (Speaking Volumes) as the latest winner of The Poetry Society’s prestigious prize. Jay Bernard is from London and is the author of three poetry pamphlets: The Red and Yellow Nothing (Ink Sweat & Tears and Café Writers, 2016), English Breakfast (Math Paper Press, 2013), and Your Sign is Cuckoo, Girl (Tall Lighthouse, 2008). Surge: Side A is a performance work investigating the New Cross Fire of 1981, in which thirteen young black people lost their lives in a defining moment in Black British history. It was produced by Speaking Volumes and was performed at the Roundhouse, London, as part of The Last Word Festival 2017. Surge: Side A won Jay Bernard the 2017 £5,000 prize, which is funded by Carol Ann Duffy from her honararium as Poet Laureate. Judge Sally Beamish said: “An intensely personal relating of the New Cross massacre; powerful, lyrical and communicated with extraordinary intimacy. I was particularly struck by their drawing of a parallel between the struggle for validation in the black British community, and the poet’s own clarification of identity by transforming their body through surgery. The performances are riveting and the poems are propelled by a strong internal momentum.” Gillian Allnutt said: “How grateful I am for the honesty and vulnerability of Jay’s presence in the poems and in the performance of them.” Continues over For further information The Poetry Society Page 1 of 5 Contact Marcus Stanton 22 Betterton Street, London WC2H 9BX Tel: 020 8617 0210, Mob: 07900 891287 Tel: 020 7420 9880 Fax: 020 7240 4818 Email: [email protected] www.poetrysociety.org.uk PRESS RELEASE ctd Strictly embargoed until 8.10pm, 28 March 2018 Lemn Sissay said: “The shocking truth about Jay Bernard is that many people may not have heard their unique, inspiring and powerful voice, until now.” Jay Bernard has featured in numerous anthologies and magazines, including TEN: The New Wave and Out of Bounds: Black British Writers and Place. They were part of the original line-up for two Speaking Volumes Breaking Ground tours to the USA, showcasing the best Black British writers from the UK. Jay was Poet-in-Residence at the George Padmore Institute in 2016, out of which came the poems for their upcoming collection, Surge (2019). They are also film programmer at BFI Flare (London’s LGBT film festival). The following poets were shortlisted for the award, for poetry presented or published in the UK during 2017: Jay Bernard for Surge: Side A (Speaking Volumes) Caroline Bird for In These Days of Prohibition (Carcanet) Kayo Chingonyi for Kumukanda (Chatto) Inua Ellams for #afterhours (Nine Arches Press) Matthew Francis for The Mabinogi (Faber & Faber) Antony Owen for The Nagasaki Elder (V Press) Greta Stoddart for Who’s There? (BBC) The Ted Hughes Award for New Work in Poetry, presented annually by The Poetry Society since 2009, celebrates the outstanding contributions made by poets to our cultural life, acknowledging the possibilities of poetry both on the page and beyond. The £5,000 prize is donated by Carol Ann Duffy, funded from the annual honorarium the Poet Laureate traditionally receives from HM The Queen. The winner of the 2017 award was announced on 28 March 2018, at a reception at the Savile Club, London. Carol Ann Duffy presented Jay Bernard with their prize. From Surge: Side A by Jay Bernard Surge 1 I was so weak, I was sickened, I was grieved, I was sad, I was everything that’s bad – my voice became the glass breaking in the heat I was so sickened and so grieved I was so weak – I called and no-one seemed to call with me no-one seemed to know or see what I had seen – Continues over For further information The Poetry Society Page 2 of 5 Contact Marcus Stanton 22 Betterton Street, London WC2H 9BX Tel: 020 8617 0210, Mob: 07900 891287 Tel: 020 7420 9880 Fax: 020 7240 4818 Email: [email protected] www.poetrysociety.org.uk PRESS RELEASE ctd Strictly embargoed until 8.10pm, 28 March 2018 I was so sickened and so grieved and I said to the child I knew harboured in the fire – jump Yvonne, jump Paul, jump – I said, I called – jump Yvonne, jump Paul, jump – my voice it was so weak – Paul, jump – so sickened and so grieved – ENDS – MEDIA ENQUIRIES: for further information, images or to arrange interviews please contact: Marcus Stanton • Tel: 020 8617 0210 • Mob: 07900 891287 • Email: [email protected] Notes to Editors Ted Hughes Award judges Gillian Allnutt Gillian Allnutt was born in London and lives in County Durham. Her collections Nantucket and the Angel and Lintel were both shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot Prize. Poems from these collections are included in her Bloodaxe retrospective How the Bicycle Shone: New & Selected Poems (2007), which draws on six published books plus a new collection, Wolf Light, and was a Poetry Book Society Special Commendation. Her most recent collections, both from Bloodaxe, are indwelling (2013) and wake (2018). From 1983 to 1988 she was poetry editor of City Limits magazine. She won the Northern Rock Foundation Writer's Award in 2005, received a Cholmondeley Award in 2010, and was awarded the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry 2016 in February 2017. Photo: Phyllis Christopher. Sally Beamish Sally Beamish was born in London, moving to Scotland in 1990 to develop her career as a composer. She has written for many internationally renowned soloists (including Håkan Hardenberger, John Harle, Branford Marsalis, Tabea Zimmermann, James Crabb, Dame Evelyn Glennie and Colin Currie), perfoms regularly as violist, pianist and narrator, and as a presenter and contributor on TV and radio. Her music is performed and broadcast internationally, and since 1999 she has been championed by the BIS label, who have recorded much of her work. In February 2012 Beamish was BBC Radio 3 Composer of the Week; and this was repeated in 2015. Her works have been widely performed and awarded including Reed Stanzas, which won a Royal Philharmonic Society Award; Flodden, which was shortlisted for both a Royal Philharmonic Society and a British Composer Award; and Spinal Chords, one of the PRS 20x12 Olympic commissions. For the Shakespeare centenary, A Shakespeare Masque was premiered at Stratford by Ex Cathedra, with text by poet laureate Carol Ann Duffy. Her second ballet, The Little Mermaid, with choreographer David Nixon, for Northern Ballet, toured the UK in 2017/18. At present Sally Beamish is composer-in-residence with the Academy of St Martin-in-the-Fields. Sally Beamish is the recipient of an honorary doctorate from the University of Glasgow, a Creative Scotland Award, and a Paul Hamlyn Award. She was recently made a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. With composer Alasdair Nicolson, Sally Beamish co-directs the annual St. Magnus Composers’ Course in Orkney. Her music is published by Edition Peters and by Norsk Musikforlag. Photo: Ashley Coombes. Continues over For further information The Poetry Society Page 3 of 5 Contact Marcus Stanton 22 Betterton Street, London WC2H 9BX Tel: 020 8617 0210, Mob: 07900 891287 Tel: 020 7420 9880 Fax: 020 7240 4818 Email: [email protected] www.poetrysociety.org.uk PRESS RELEASE ctd Strictly embargoed until 8.10pm, 28 March 2018 Lemn Sissay Lemn Sissay is the author of a series of collections of poetry, including his book of new and selected poems Gold from the Stone (2016). His sculpture poem ‘Gilt of Cain’ was unveiled by Bishop Desmond Tutu. He has also written plays for stage and BBC radio. He is the first poet to write for the London Olympics and received an MBE from the Queen for Services to Literature. He is associate artist at the Southbank Centre. Photo: Hamish Brown. Ted Hughes Award shortlisted poets Jay Bernard Jay Bernard is from London and works as a writer and film programmer at BFI Flare (London’s LGBT film festival). They are the author of three pamphlets, The Red and Yellow Nothing (2016), English Breakfast (2013), and Your Sign is Cuckoo, Girl (2008), and have been featured in numerous anthologies and magazines, including TEN: The New Wave and Out of Bounds: Black British Writers and Place. They were part of the original line-up for two Speaking Volumes Breaking Ground tours to the USA, showcasing the best Black British writers from the UK. Jay was Poet-in-Residence at the George Padmore Institute in 2016, out of which came the poems for their upcoming collection, Surge (2019), based on the New Cross Fire of 1981 in which fourteen young black people lost their lives. Caroline Bird Caroline Bird is an award-winning poet. Her debut, Looking Through Letterboxes, was published when she was 15. She won a major Eric Gregory Award in 2002 and was shortlisted for the Geoffrey Dearmer Prize in 2001, and the Dylan Thomas Prize in 2008 and 2010. Her latest collection, In These Days of Prohibition, was shortlisted for the 2017 T.S. Eliot Prize. She was one of the five official poets at London Olympics 2012. She is also a playwright and in 2013, she was short-listed for Most Promising New Playwright at the Off-West-End Awards. Kayo Chingonyi Kayo Chingonyi is a fellow of the Complete Works programme for diversity and quality in British Poetry and the author of two pamphlets, Some Bright Elegance (Salt, 2012) and The Colour of James Brown’s Scream (Akashic, 2016).