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When Simon Armitage burst on to the poetry scene in 1989 with his spectacular debut Zoom!, readers were introduced to an exceptional new talent who would reshape the landscape of contemporary poetry in the years to come. Now, twenty-five years on, Simon Armitage’s reputation as one of the nation’s most original, most respected and best-loved poets seems secure. Paper Aeroplane: Poems 1989-2014 is the author’s own selection from across a quarter-century of work, from his debut to the latest, uncollected work. Drawing upon all of his award-winning poetry collections, including Kid, Book of Matches, The Universal Home Doctor and Seeing Stars, this generous selection provides an essential gathering of this most thrilling of poets, and is key reading for students and general readers alike.
What surprises is how urgent and contemporary his early poems still read ... this selected poems proves that he has written some of the very best, most memorable poems of recent decades ... a writer who has had a game-changing influence on his contemporaries, and continues to cast a shadow over younger poets.
There is no other poet writing in modern Britain who has his feeling for its words and things: the cashpoints, the power tools, the "mail-order driftwood"; the clichés, the jokes, the unspoken emotions. ... the most popular English poet since Larkin.
Armitage is that rare beast: a poet whose work is ambitious, accomplished and complex as well as popular.
'The best poet of his generation.'
Simon Armitage was born in West Yorkshire and is Professor of Poetry at the University of Leeds. A recipient of numerous prizes and awards, his collections of poetry include Seeing Stars (2010), The Unaccompanied (2017), Sandettie Light Vessel Automatic (2019), Magnetic Field (2020) and his acclaimed translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (2007). He writes extensively for television…
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