Bhanu Kapil was born in England to Indian parents, and she grew up in a South Asian, working-class community in London. She lives in the UK and US where she spent 21 years at Naropa University in Boulder, Colorado. She is the author of six books of poetry/prose: The Vertical Interrogation of Strangers (Kelsey Street Press, 2001), Incubation: a space for monsters (Leon Works, 2006), humanimal (Kelsey Street Press, 2009), Schizophrene (Nightboat, 2011), Ban en Banlieue (Nightboat, 2015) and How to Wash a Heart (Pavilion Poetry 2020), which was a Poetry Book Society Choice.
Shortlisted Works
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In 2023 the T. S. Eliot Prize celebrated its 30th anniversary. We marked the occasion by looking back at the collections which have won ‘the Prize poets most want to win’ (Sir Andrew Motion). Bhanu Kapil won the T. S. Eliot Prize 2020, judged by Lavinia Greenlaw (Chair), Mona Arshi...
The T. S. Eliot Foundation is delighted to announce that the winner of the T. S. Eliot Prize 2020 is Bhanu Kapil for How to Wash a Heart, published by Pavilion Poetry (Liverpool University Press). Chair Lavinia Greenlaw said: Our Shortlist celebrated the ways in which poetry is responding to...
Judges Lavinia Greenlaw (Chair), Mona Arshi and Andrew McMillan have chosen the 2020 T. S. Eliot Prize Shortlist from 153 poetry collections submitted by British and Irish publishers. The shortlist comprises work from five men and five women; two Americans; as well as poets of Native American, Chinese Indonesian and...
