Our PBS Selectors sure know how to spot the future prize winners and best emerging talent, their incredible track record of predicting the next big thing continues with at least 7 recent PBS Selections included on the Forward Prizes for Poetry 2019 shortlists.
The best collection category includes PBS Selector Vidyan Ravinthiran's collection, as well as the PBS Summer Choice Deaf Republic by Ilya Kaminsky and Vertigo & Ghost by Fiona Benson. The Best First Collection includes PBS Winter Choice The Perseverance by Raymond Antrobus and Summer Recommendation Surge by Jay Bernard and recent Northern Poetry Symposium performer Stephen Sexton.
The annual Forward Prizes are among the UK's most coveted literary awards and will be awarded on 20th October 2019 at the Royal Festival Hall, Southbank Centre. This year's judging panel included Tara Bergin, Andrew McMillan, Carol Rumens and Jamie Andrews.
The Forward Prize for Best Collection (£10,000)
City of Departures by Helen Tookey (Carcanet)
Deaf Republic by Ilya Kaminsky (Faber & Faber)
The Million-petalled Flower of Being Here by Vidyan Ravinthiran (Bloodaxe Books)
Noctuary by Niall Campbell (Bloodaxe Books)
Vertigo & Ghost by Fiona Benson (Cape)
If All the World and Love Were Young by Stephen Sexton (Penguin Books)
The Perseverance by Raymond Antrobus (Penned in the Margins)
Significant Other by Isabel Galleymore (Carcanet)
Surge by Jay Bernard (Chatto & Windus)
Truth Street by David Cain (Smokestack Books)
The Forward Prize for Best Single Poem (£1,000)
‘Bridge’ by Jonathan Edwards (The Frogmore Papers)
‘Comic Timing’ by Holly Pester (Granta Magazine)
‘Forty Names’ by Parwana Fayyaz (PN Review)
‘Highbury Park’ by Liz Berry (Wild Court)
‘The Window’ by Mary Jean Chan (The National Poetry Competition, Poetry Society)