Poet Jason Allen-Paisant wins prestigious TS Eliot Prize

16 Jan 2024

University of Manchester Senior Lecturer and poet Jason Allen-Paisant has been named the winner of the UK’s most prestigious poetry prize, the TS Eliot Prize.

Senior Lecturer and poet Jason Allen-Paisant has been named the winner of the UK’s most prestigious poetry prize, the TS Eliot Prize.

Allen-Paisant’s collection, Self-Portrait As Othello, explores Black masculinity and immigrant identity. The Jamaican poet was announced as this year’s winner during a ceremony at the Wallace Collection in London on 15th January.

“Self-Portrait As Othello is a book with large ambitions that are met with great imaginative capacity, freshness and technical flair,” said the judging panel, made up of the poets Paul Muldoon, Sasha Dugdale and Denise Saul.

Dr Kaye Mitchell, Director of the Centre for New Writing at the University of Manchester said: “Self-Portrait as Othello has rightly swept the board of poetry prizes in 2023 and the TS Eliot prize is the crowning achievement for this deeply intelligent, bold and captivating collection. We couldn’t be more delighted for Jason!”

This award follows on from Dr Allen Paisant winning the Forward Prize for Best Collection in October 2023; the book has since been shortlisted for the Writers’ Prize too.

The TS Eliot Prize shortlist also featured Centre for New Writing graduate Joe Carrick-Varty, who was recognised for his debut collection, More Sky.

Jason’s collection is published by Manchester-based Carcanet Press, a publisher with a long association with the University, through the John Rylands Research Institute Library, and is run by Professor John McAuliffe and Professor Michael Schmidt, who also teach at the Centre for New Writing.

Allen-Paisant is a Senior Lecturer in Critical Theory and Creative Writing at the University of Manchester. His first collection, Thinking With Trees, was published in 2021. His non-fiction book, Scanning the Bush, will be published in 2024.