Fiona Sampson MBE FRSL is a poet, literary biographer and writer about place. A former professional violinist, she has a PhD in applied philosophy of language and is presently Senior Research Fellow, Harris Manchester College, University of Oxford. She has published more than thirty books of poetry, criticism, philosophy of language, and writing about place, and received the Newdigate Prize, a Cholmondeley Award and Writer’s Awards from the Arts Councils of England and of Wales and the Society of Authors, as well as various Poetry Book Society recommendations and international prizes in Macedonia and the US. She has twice been shortlisted for both the T. S. Eliot Prize and Forward Prizes. She has been widely published since judging the T. S. Eliot Prize 2014. Poetry collections include Coleshill (Chatto & Windus, 2013), The Catch (Chatto & Windus, 2016) and Come Down (Corsair, 2021), which received the European Lyric Atlas Prize, Naim Frashëri Laureateship, and Wales Poetry Book of the Year. The School on the Coast Road: new and selected poems was published by Red River, India, in 2024. Awarded an MBE for services to literature, she is a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature and of the Wordsworth Trust. Photo © Kitty Sullivan
Shortlisted Works
Related News Stories
This article on the T. S. Eliot Prize was first published on the Poetry Book Society website in 2015. The Poetry Book Society is delighted to announce that the winner of the T. S. Eliot Prize for Poetry 2014 is David Harsent’s Fire Songs, published by Faber & Faber....
This article on the T. S. Eliot Prize was first published on the Poetry Book Society website in 2014. The Poetry Book Society is delighted to announce a wonderfully strong and varied Shortlist for the T. S. Eliot Prize 2014, with two poets from the US, one from India, three...
This article on the T. S. Eliot Prize was first published on the Poetry Book Society website in 2014. The Poetry Book Society is delighted to announce the judges and call for submissions for the T. S. Eliot Prize for Poetry 2014. Helen Dunmore will be Chair of the judging...
This article on the T. S. Eliot Prize was first published on the Poetry Book Society website in 2014. In autumn 2013, the Poetry Book Society organised a ten-venue national tour, funded by Arts Council England, to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of the T. S. Eliot Prize. At each...
This article on the T. S. Eliot Prize was first published on the Poetry Book Society website in 2013. This autumn the Poetry Book Society will be organising a ten-venue national tour, funded by Arts Council England, to celebrate the twentieth anniversary of the T. S. Eliot Prize. At...
This article on the T. S. Eliot Prize was first published on the Poetry Book Society website in 2010. The Poetry Book Society is delighted to announce the shortlist for the T. S. Eliot Prize for Poetry 2010. Judges Anne Stevenson (Chair), Bernardine Evaristo and Michael Symmons Roberts have chosen...
This article on the T. S. Eliot Prize was first published on the Poetry Book Society website in 2007. The T. S. Eliot Prize 2007 Shortlist has been announced. This year’s shortlisted poets are: Ian Duhig – The Speed of Dark (Picador Poetry) Alan Gillis – Hawks and Doves (Gallery...
