The English Association has announced the shortlist for the 2019 Michael Murphy Memorial Prize Poetry Competition.

The Shortlist

• Raymond Antrobus, The Perseverance, Penned in the Margins
• Kayo Chingonyi, Kumukanda, Penguin
• Sophie Collins, Who is Mary Sue? Faber& Faber
• Zaffar Kunial, Us, Faber& Faber
• Hannah Sullivan, Three Poems, Faber& Faber

The Michael Murphy Memorial Prize is a biennial prize for a distinctive first book of poetry in English published in Britain or Ireland. The prize was established by colleagues at Nottingham Trent University in honour of the Liverpool-born poet Michael Murphy, who was 43 when he died of a brain tumour in May 2009.

This year marks the fifth biennial prize of £1,000 for a distinctive first volume of poetry in English published in Britain or Ireland, between 1 January 2017 and 31 December 2018. The judges for this year’s award are Professor Deryn Rees-Jones, University of Liverpool; Professor Linda Anderson, Newcastle University; and Dr Jonathan Ellis, University of Sheffield.

The winner will be announced on National Poetry Day (4 October 2019), and the award will be presented at the next English Association Annual General Meeting (27 May 2020).