Christopher Reid was born in Hong Kong in 1949 and studied at Oxford. He then worked as a freelance journalist and as book review editor of Crafts magazine. His first poetry collection, Arcadia (1979), won the 1980 Somerset Maugham Award and the Hawthornden Prize. This has been followed by Pea Soup (1982); Katerina Brac (1985); In The Echoey Tunnel (1991); Expanded Universes (1996); For and After (2002); Mr Mouth (2005) and The Song of Lunch (2009). He is often cited as co-founder with Craig Raine of the ‘Martian School’ of poetry which employs exotic and humorous metaphors to defamiliarise everyday experiences and objects. He has also written two books of poetry for children: All Sorts (1999) and Alphabicycle Order (2001). A Scattering (Areté Books) is dedicated to the memory of his wife, the actress Lucinda Gane, and was shortlisted for the T. S. Eliot Prize 2009. His publications since then include The Curiosities (2015), The Late Sun (2020) and Toys / Tricks / Traps (2023), all Faber & Faber.
Shortlisted Works
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