Matthew Francis shortlisted for the Ted Hughes Award

Matthew Francis shortlisted for the Ted Hughes Award

15 March 2018

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Poet Matthew Francis has been shortlisted for the Ted Hughes Award for New Work in Poetry, for The Mabinogi (Faber & Faber).

The volume is a retelling of the first four stories of the Welsh national epic, The Mabinogi and captures the magic and strangeness of this medieval world.

Judges Gillian Allnutt, Sally Beamish and Lemn Sissay selected their shortlist of seven poets who released groundbreaking works in 2017, from a hundred recommendations from members of The Poetry Society and Poetry Book Society.

The Ted Hughes Award seeks to recognise excellence in poetry, highlighting outstanding contributions made by poets to our cultural life. The £5,000 prize is donated by Carol Ann Duffy, funded from the annual honorarium the Poet Laureate traditionally receives.

The winner will be announced at the Ted Hughes Award & National Poetry Competition awards ceremony held this year on 28 March 2018.

2017 Ted Hughes Award Shortlist

  • 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 Radio).

The Mabinogi by Matthew Francis is selected to the Wales Literature Exchange 2017 - 2018 Bookcase, our annual selection of Welsh literary works which we recommend for translation.

Read more about the work here.