This was the speech given by Ruth Padel at the Award Ceremony for the 2016 T. S. Eliot Prize at the Wallace Collection in London on 16 January 2017:
READThank you, first of all, from the whole poetry community to Chris Holifield who has built up this prize-judged-only-by-poets over 14 years and now has helped it continue in a new incarnation.
Disturbing tale of lost innocence wins world’s most prestigious poetry prize
The T. S. Eliot Foundation is delighted to announce that this year’s winner of the 2016 T. S. Eliot Prize is Jacob Polley for his remarkable new collection Jackself.
After months of reading and deliberation, Judges Ruth Padel (Chair), Julia Copus and Alan Gillis chose the winner from a strong shortlist of six women and four men. READ
All ten poets shortlisted for the 2016 T. S. Eliot Prize have accepted the invitation to read at the T. S. Eliot Prize Readings. For a fabulous evening of poetry join us at 7pm on Sunday 15 January 2017 in Southbank Centre’s Royal Festival Hall. READ
Today we are proud to launch tseliot.com, the official online home for the poet generally regarded as the greatest of the twentieth century.
Here you can read ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ and The Waste Land in full, complete with detailed annotations. READ
