Paper Aeroplane: Selected Poems 1989–2014

Product Description When Simon Armitage burst on to the poetry scene in 1989 with his spectacular debut Zoom!, readers were introduced to an exceptional new talent who would reshape the landscape of contemporary poetry in the years to come. Now, Armitage's reputation as one of the nation's most original, most respected and most influential poets seems secure. Paper Aeroplane: Poems 1989-2014 is the author's own choice of work from across a quarter-century of publishing. Drawing upon all of his award-winning poetry collections, including Kid, Book of Matches, The Universal Home Doctor, Seeing Stars and The Unaccompanied, as well as his medieval translations and verse dramas, Paper Aeroplane represents a generous and thrilling gathering of work from one of contemporary poetry's most essential voices. Review What surprises is how urgent and contemporary his early poems still read ... this selected poems proves that he has written some of the very best, most memorable poems of recent decades ... a writer who has had a game-changing influence on his contemporaries, and continues to cast a shadow over younger poets. -- Ben Wilkinson ― Guardian There is no other poet writing in modern Britain who has his feeling for its words and things: the cashpoints, the power tools, the "mail-order driftwood"; the clichés, the jokes, the unspoken emotions. ... the most popular English poet since Larkin. -- Jeremy Noel-Tod ― Sunday Times Armitage is that rare beast: a poet whose work is ambitious, accomplished and complex as well as popular. -- Charlotte Runcie ― Sunday Telegraph The best poet of his generation. -- Craig Raine ― Observer The first poet of serious artistic intent since Philip Larkin to have achieved popularity ... it is possible that he will attain the sort of proverbial status Larkin now occupies. -- Sean O'Brien His verse is immediate, entertaining, engaged with the world, and his ear for the cadences of English is terrific. -- Stephen Knight ― Independent on Sunday Book Description The Poet Laureate's essential selection of poems About the Author Simon Armitage was born in West Yorkshire and is Professor of Poetry at the University of Leeds. A recipient of numerous prizes and awards, his collections of poetry include Seeing Stars (2010), The Unaccompanied (2017), Sandettie Light Vessel Automatic (2019), Magnetic Field (2020)and his acclaimed translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (2007). He writes extensively for television and radio, and is the author of two novels and the non-fiction bestsellers All Points North (1998), Walking Home (2012) and Walking Away (2015). His theatre works include The Last Days of Troy, performed at Shakespeare's Globe in 2014. From 2015 to 2019, he served as Professor of Poetry at the University of Oxford, and, in 2018, he was awarded the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry. Simon Armitage is Poet Laureate.