Robin Robertson (born in 1955) is a Scottish poet.

Biography

Robertson was brought up on the north-east coast of Scotland, but has spent most of his professional life in London. After working as an editor at

Penguin Books Penguin Books Limited is a Germany, German-owned English publishing, publishing house. It was co-founded in 1935 by Allen Lane with his brothers Richard and John, as a line of the publishers the Bodley Head, only becoming a separate company the ...

and

Secker and Warburg Harvill Secker is a British publishing company formed in 2005 from the merger of Secker & Warburg and the Harvill Press. History Secker & Warburg Secker & Warburg was formed in 1935 from a takeover of Martin Secker, which was in receivership, ...

, he became poetry and fiction editor at

Jonathan Cape Jonathan Cape is a British publishing firm headquartered in London and founded in 1921 by Herbert Jonathan Cape, who was head of the firm until his death. Cape and his business partner Wren Howard (1893–1968) set up the publishing house in ...

. Robertson's poetry appears regularly in the ''

London Review of Books The ''London Review of Books'' (''LRB'') is a British literary magazine published bimonthly that features articles and essays on fiction and non-fiction subjects, which are usually structured as book reviews. History The ''London Review of Book ...

'' and ''

The New York Review of Books ''The New York Review of Books'' (or ''NYREV'' or ''NYRB'') is a semi-monthly magazine with articles on literature, culture, economics, science and current affairs. Published in New York City, it is inspired by the idea that the discussion of ...

'', and is represented in many anthologies. In 2004, he edited ''Mortification: Writers' Stories of Their Public Shame'', which collects seventy commissioned pieces by international authors. In 2006 he published ''The Deleted World'', a new version of the Swedish poet

Tomas Tranströmer Tomas Gösta Tranströmer (; 15 April 1931 – 26 March 2015) was a Swedish poet, psychologist and translator. His poems captured the long winters in Sweden, the rhythm of the seasons and the palpable, atmospheric beauty of nature. Tranströmer' ...

, and in 2008 a new translation of ''

Medea In Greek mythology, Medea (; ; ) is the daughter of Aeëtes, King Aeëtes of Colchis. Medea is known in most stories as a sorceress, an accomplished "wiktionary:φαρμακεία, pharmakeía" (medicinal magic), and is often depicted as a high- ...

'', which has been dramatised for stage and radio. Robertson was a trustee of the Griffin Trust for Excellence in Poetry (and is now a trustee emeritus).

Awards

Robertson's first volume of poetry, ''A Painted Field'', won the 1997

Forward Prize The Forward Prizes for Poetry are major British awards for poetry, presented annually at a public ceremony in London. They were founded in 1992 by William Sieghart with the aim of celebrating excellence in poetry and increasing its audience. The ...

for Best First Collection and the Scottish First Book of the Year Award. ''Slow Air'' followed in 2002, and his third book, ''Swithering'', was published in 2006, winning the Forward Prize for Best Collection. In 2004, Robertson received the E. M. Forster Award from the

American Academy of Arts and Letters The American Academy of Arts and Letters is a 300-member honor society whose goal is to "foster, assist, and sustain excellence" in American literature, Music of the United States, music, and Visual art of the United States, art. Its fixed number ...

. In 2009 he was elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Literature The Royal Society of Literature (RSL) is a learned society founded in 1820 by King George IV to "reward literary merit and excite literary talent". A charity that represents the voice of literature in the UK, the RSL has about 800 Fellows, elect ...

He completed the set of Forward Prizes in 2009 when "At Roane Head" won the award for Best Single Poem. This poem is included in his fourth collection, ''The Wrecking Light'' (2010), a volume shortlisted for the 2010

, the Costa Poetry Award and the

T. S. Eliot Prize The T. S. Eliot Prize for Poetry is a prize for poetry awarded by the T. S. Eliot Foundation. For many years it was awarded by the Eliots' Poetry Book Society (UK) for "the best collection of new verse in English first published in the UK or t ...

. In 2013 he was honourably awarded the international, German

Petrarca-Preis Petrarca-Preis was a European literary and translation award named after the Italian Renaissance poet Francesco Petrarca or Petrarch. Founded in 1975 by German art historian and publisher Hubert Burda, it was primarily designed for contempora ...

, sharing it with

Adonis In Greek mythology, Adonis (; ) was the mortal lover of the goddesses Aphrodite and Persephone. He was considered to be the ideal of male beauty in classical antiquity. The myth goes that Adonis was gored by a wild boar during a hunting trip ...

. In 2013, his book ''Hill of Doors'' was shortlisted for the

Costa Book Award for Poetry The Costa Book Award for Poetry, formerly known as the Whitbread Award (1971–2006), was an annual literary award for poetry collections, part of the Costa Book Awards The Costa Book Awards were a set of annual literary awards recognising Eng ...

. His narrative poem, ''

The Long Take ''The Long Take, or A Way to Lose More Slowly'', known simply as The Long Take, is a novel in narrative poetry form with noir style by Scottish poet Robin Robertson. It was published in 2018 by Picador. The story-line is set in United States po ...

'', won the

Goldsmiths Prize The Goldsmiths Prize is a British literary award, founded in 2013 by Goldsmiths, University of London, in association with the ''New Statesman.'' It is awarded annually to a British or Irish piece of fiction that "breaks the mould or extends the ...

for innovative fiction. In 2019 it won him the 10th

Walter Scott Prize The Walter Scott Prize for Historical Fiction is a British literary award founded in 2010.Walter S ...

, making him the first Scot and first poet to win the award. It was shortlisted for the 2018

Man Booker Prize The Booker Prize, formerly the Booker Prize for Fiction (1969–2001) and the Man Booker Prize (2002–2019), is a prestigious literary award conferred each year for the best single work of sustained fiction written in the English language, wh ...

. In 2019 he was a contributor to ''A New Divan: A Lyrical Dialogue Between East and West (''Gingko Library).

Poetry collections

* ''A Painted Field'' Picador, 1997. ; Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 1999, * ''Slow Air'', Harcourt, 2002. *(editor) * *

, ''The Deleted World'' Enitharmon Press, 2006. *

Euripides Euripides () was a Greek tragedy, tragedian of classical Athens. Along with Aeschylus and Sophocles, he is one of the three ancient Greek tragedians for whom any plays have survived in full. Some ancient scholars attributed ninety-five plays to ...

, ''Medea'', Random House, 2008. * * ''Hill of Doors'', Picador, 2013. * ''Sailing the Forest: Selected Poems'', Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2014. *

, ''Bacchae'', Harper Collins, 2014. * ''

'', Picador, 2018. * ''

Grimoire A grimoire () (also known as a book of spells, magic book, or a spellbook) is a textbook of magic, typically including instructions on how to create magical objects like talismans and amulets, how to perform magical spells, charms, and divin ...

'', Picador, 2020.

References

External links

*
Profile
at

Griffin Poetry Prize The Griffin Poetry Prize is a Canadian poetry award. It was founded in 2000 by businessman and philanthropist Scott Griffin. Before 2022, two separate awards went to one Canadian and one international poet who writes in the English language. I ...

Profile
at Contemporary Writers
Profile
at the

Poetry Foundation The Poetry Foundation is a United States literary society that seeks to promote poetry and lyricism in the wider culture. It was formed from ''Poetry'' magazine, which it continues to publish, with a 2003 gift of $200 million from philanthrop ...

Interview
with ''

Open Letters Monthly ''Open Letters Monthly'' or ''Open Letters Monthly: an Arts and Literature Review'', was an online arts and culture magazine. It was founded in 2007 by Sam Sacks, John Cotter, and Steve Donoghue, and published its last issue in 2017. It features l ...

''
Poems
at Poets.org
Poems and audio recordings
at

Poetry Archive The Poetry Archive is a free, web-based library formed to hold recordings of English language poets reading their own work. The Archive holds over 20000 poems and keeps the recordings safe and accessible so that current and future visitors can ...

Review of ''The Wrecking Light''
in ''

The Guardian ''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in Manchester in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'' and changed its name in 1959, followed by a move to London. Along with its sister paper, ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardi ...

'' (20 February 2010) {{DEFAULTSORT:Robertson, Robin Living people Fellows of the Royal Society of Literature 1955 births Translators of Ancient Greek texts Walter Scott Prize winners Goldsmiths Prize winners