Wayne Holloway-Smith

Wayne Holloway-Smith was born in Wiltshire and lives in London. His first book-length collection, Alarum (Bloodaxe Books, 2017), was a Poetry Book Society Wildcard Choice and was shortlisted for the Roehampton Poetry Prize and the Seamus Heaney Centre for Poetry Prize for First Full Collection. The final poem, ‘Short’, won the Geoffrey Dearmer Prize 2016. His second collection was I CAN’T WAIT FOR THE WENDING (Test Centre Publications 2018). He won the National Poetry Competition 2018 with his poem ‘the posh mums are boxing in the square’ from his second book-length book of poetry, Love Minus Love (Bloodaxe Books, 2020), which was a Poetry Book Society Wild Card Choice and shortlisted for the T. S. Eliot Prize and the Ledbury Munthe Poetry Prize for Second Collections. His pamphlet length poem Lobsters was published by Pakina Press in 2022. In 2022, he was appointed Editor of The Poetry Review, the quarterly magazine of The Poetry Society. Author photo © Mark Sherratt