Born in 1986

Raymond Antrobus was born in London, Hackney to an English mother and Jamaican father. In 2019, he became the first-ever poet to be awarded the Rathbone Folio Prize for best work of literature in any genre. Other accolades include the Ted Hughes Award and the Guardian Poetry Book of The Year 2018, as well as being shortlisted for the Forward Prize and the Costa Prize. His poems Jamaican British, The Perseverance and Happy Birthday Moon have been added to the UK’s GCSE syllabus. Raymond Antrobus’ collection of poems The Perseverance was awarded the Sunday Times/University of Warwick Young Writer of the Year Award in 2019.

He is an Ambassador for The Poetry School and a board member for English PEN (an organisation that promotes freedom of expression and literature across frontiers). He is also an advocate for several D/deaf charities including Deaf Kidz International and National Deaf Children’s Society. His children’s book about early years hearing loss, Can Bears Ski?, won the Honouree Ezra Jack Keats Award in 2021.

Chosen by the staff and students of the Warwick Writing Programme, to respond to the Faculty and to the people who work and write here, Raymond visited the campus in June 2021 to explore the half-finished building with the architects. He noted the accommodation of trees by the architecture.

Resonance