Bloodaxe Books

12/12/2025

Poets Jessica Traynor and Thomas McCarthy contributed to this lovely feature on RTÉ Radio 1's Arena of 11 December. They were reading some of their favourite winter poems and discussing them with host Rick O'Shea. Jessica also read ‘The Ice Princess Falls’ from her recently-published fourth collection New Arcana (from 22:20).

For reviews, poem features, books of the year and interviews with Jessica Traynor about New Arcana, see:
https://www.bloodaxebooks.com/news?articleid=1559

Poets Jessica Traynor and Thomas McCarthy talk winter poetry to remind us of the season's quiet beauty.

11/12/2025

Welsh poet Gwyneth Lewis was a guest on BBC Radio 4's A Good Read on 8 December, alongside author Annabel Abbs and host Harriett Gilbert. They were discussing their three chosen books.

Gwyneth Lewis's sixth English language poetry collection, First Rain in Paradise, was published by Bloodaxe in March. For links to reviews, interviews and to an excellent BBC Radio 4 feature about fellow Bloodaxe poet RS Thomas presented by Gwyneth, see:
https://www.bloodaxebooks.com/news?articleid=1480

Poet Gwyneth Lewis and author Annabel Abbs join Harriett to talk favourite books.

09/12/2025

'I can’t think of two more artful commentaries on today’s world or two more inviting entryways into modern poetry.’ – Sarah Hall, The New Statesman, choosing the joint winners of the Forward Prize for Best Collection, Vidyan Ravinthiran's Avidyā (Bloodaxe) and Karen Solie's Wellwater (Picador), as her books of the year.

Sarah Hall was Chair of Judges for the Forward Prizes for Poetry 2025. For more Books of the Year choices for Avidyā, and for links to joint interviews with Vidyan and Karen on BBC Radio 4's Front Row and online in The London Magazine, see:
https://www.bloodaxebooks.com/news?articleid=1536

New Statesman writers and guests – including Jonathan Franzen, Jacqueline Rose, Marina Warner and Slavoj Žižek – choose their favourite reading this year

08/12/2025

An interview with American poet Marie Howe features in this week's edition of the Church Times. She was talking to Martin Wroe about her poetry, including her Pulitzer Prize in Poetry 2025-winning retrospective What the Earth Seemed to Say: New & Selected Poems, which was published in the UK & Ireland by Bloodaxe in November last year.

For reviews, poem features and a video of Marie Howe's joint online launch reading, see:
https://www.bloodaxebooks.com/news?articleid=1459

Marie Howe, winner of this year’s Pulitzer Prize for poetry, talks to Martin Wroe about saints and the spiritual

08/12/2025

Vidyan Ravinthiran's third collection Avidyā, joint winner of the Forward Prizes for Poetry Prize for Best Collection 2025 and Gillian Allnutt's T. S. Eliot Prize-shortlisted tenth collection Lode were both included in Rishi Dastidar's poetry books of the year feature in The Guardian. In print in Saturday magazine of 6 December.

For more books of the year choices for these two collections and for other Bloodaxe titles, see:
https://www.bloodaxebooks.com/news?articleid=1579

From Seamus Heaney’s collected poems and Simon Armitage’s animal spirits, to prizewinners Karen Solie and Vidyan Ravinthiran

05/12/2025

Very many congratulations to Carolyn Forché on being awarded an honorary doctorate by Newcastle University today, bestowed upon her by Chancellor Imtiaz Dharker. She said: "It's one of the greatest honours of my life. It was such a moving ceremony and I am so happy to be back in Newcastle, my alma mater, and to be among my colleagues and watch this class of 25 receive their degrees." https://www.ncl.ac.uk/press/articles/latest/2025/12/winterhonorarydegrees/

05/12/2025

Very many congratulations to poet and playwright Stewart Conn, who was one of the leading Scottish figures honoured in The Saltire Society's Fletcher of Saltoun Awards last night in Edinburgh. The Awards for Arts and Humanities went to violinist Nicola Benedetti CBE and to Stewart Conn, who served as Edinburgh's inaugural Makar from 2002 to 2005.
https://www.bloodaxebooks.com/news?articleid=1580

03/12/2025

'a strikingly beautiful nod to the lasting echoes of a friendship’ – Lauren Murphy, Culture on RTÉ, on Jessica Traynor's fourth poetry collection New Arcana.

For links to an interview with Jessica on RTÉ Radio 1's Poetry People, and to reviews and poem features for New Arcana, see:
https://www.bloodaxebooks.com/news?articleid=1559

The best Irish books of 2025 Updated / Wednesday, 3 Dec 2025 09:00 Rose Keating's Oddbody is one of the best Irish books of 2025 Lauren Murphy By Lauren Murphy Freelance journalist and broadcaster, writing about music and the arts. It's been another bumper year for Irish literature - and now that 20...

03/12/2025

‘Lalić’s poetry, sensual, accessible, vivid and memorable, has gained widespread admiration and recognition. [… his] lyrical poetry is imbued with Mediterranean landscapes' - Neil Leadbeater, Write Out Loud, on The Taste of Lightning: Selected Poems by the late Serbian poet Ivan V. Lalić. An excellent in-depth review.
https://www.writeoutloud.net/public/blogentry.php?blogentryid=144126

Translator Francis R. Jones read from The Taste of Lightning at Bloodaxe's online launch event of 20 November, which also featured Danish poet Pia Tafdrup, along with Lithunanian poet Tomas Venclova and his translator Ellen Hinsey. A video of this international reading and discussion event is now on YouTube.
https://www.bloodaxebooks.com/events?articleid=1566

01/12/2025

'In times of noise and bluster, Allnutt makes space for beauty.' - Graeme Richardson, The Sunday Times, on Lode, his Poetry Book of the Year for 2025.

Gillian Allnutt's tenth collection Lode, shortlisted for the T. S. Eliot Prize, was chosen by Graeme Richardson as his Poetry Book of the Year in The Sunday Times of 30 November. He also chose Vidyan Ravinthiran's Forward Prizes for Poetry-winning third collection Avidyā as one of his poetry choices.
https://www.thetimes.com/culture/books/article/best-books-2025-new-christmas-fiction-q6fclgvvr

For a link to a brand-new in-depth interview with Gillian Allnutt on The Poems We Made Along The Way podcast, along with more reviews, features and Books of the Year choices for Lode, see:
https://www.bloodaxebooks.com/news?articleid=1506

28/11/2025

'I have been revisiting The Butterfly’s Burden by the Palestinian poet Mahmoud Darwish. The lyricism of his writing and imagination, and his attachment to his land, feel all the more important today.' – Elif Shafak, The Observer (Books of the Year)

The Butterfly's Burden (trs. Fady Joudah), which brought together three late collections by Mahmoud Darwish, was published by Bloodaxe in 2007 in an Arabic-English dual language edition. It won the Saif Ghobash–Banipal Prize for Arabic Literary Translation 2008. It was recommended by novelist Elif Shafak for The Observer's 'Something new, something old' books of the year feature (forthcoming in print on 30 November).
https://www.bloodaxebooks.com/ecs/product/the-butterfly-s-burden-884

We asked some of our favourite authors to each choose something new – their book of 2025 – and something old they’ve discovered or rediscovered in the past 12 months. Their choices cover everything from Seamus Heaney to Susan Sontag, Wilkie Collins to Arundhati Roy – and if you’re looking ...

27/11/2025

Huge congratulations to Bloodaxe poets Selima Hill and George Szirtes Poet, who were presented with The King's Gold Medal for Poetry for the years 2022 and 2024 respectively during an audience with the King at Buckingham Palace yesterday, 26 November.
https://www.bloodaxebooks.com/news?articleid=1578