CLPE Poetry Award

The winner was Off Road to Everywhere by Jonathan Gross and published by Salt. Described by Poet Laureate Carol Ann Duffy, last year’s winner of the prize and a judge as, “an outstanding winner for this Award” while fellow judge Fiona Waters who is also a previous winner said, “This is wonderful stuff. Here are real, proper poems
which are full of beauty and imagination. I loved it!”

Philip Gross is Professor of Creative Writing at Glamorgan University. His collections of poetry for adults and children include The Water Table, which won the T. S. Eliot Prize, and The All-Nite Café which won the Signal Award. Philip Gross is also the author of ten teenage novels - most recently Going for Stone, The Lastling and The Storm Garden.

The judges selected If You Could See Laughter by Mandy Coe to be Highly Commended.
The shortlisted titles are Everybody Was a Baby Once by Allan Ahlberg, illustrated by Bruce Ingman, Walker; Cuckoo Rock by Phil Bowen, illustrated by Fred James, Salt Publishing; A Million Brilliant Poems (part one) edited by Roger Stevens, illustrated by Jessie Ford, A & C Black.

The CLPE Poetry Award which was judged this year by Carol Ann Duffy, Andrew Lambirth
and Fiona Waters, honours excellence in poetry written for children. Previous winners include Jackie Kay, Roger McGough, Fiona Waters, Carol Ann Duffy, Grace Nichols and John Agard. The 2011 award was sponsored by Travelling Books.