17 Apr 08

The winners of the 2008 Christopher Tower Poetry Prize have been announced today at a lunchtime reception at Oxford University’s Christ Church College.

Eighteen year-old Emily Middleton, of The King’s School, Macclesfield, was delighted to be awarded the £3000 first prize for her poem The Five Stages.

The standard of this year’s nationwide entrants, aged between 16 and 18, was higher than ever - and the theme of ‘Change’ provided a wealth of material focusing on everything from loose change to personality changes.

Judges included poet Simon Armitage, whose memoir Gig was published this month, Alan Jenkins, poet and Deputy Editor of The Times Literary Supplement, and poet and lecturer Peter McDonald, Director of Tower Poetry at Christ Church.

Dr McDonald praised all the entrants for an 'astonishing diversity of talent'. He said: ‘The judges were particularly impressed by promise shown in the poems, where verbal flair and inventiveness were matched with impressive formal control.’

In second place, winning £1000, was Ashley McMullin, (The Sixth Form College, Colchester) for Journey to Hilly Country, and Nina Bahadur (St Paul’s Girls’ School, London) won the third prize of £500 with Heat.

Short-listed winners, who received £250, were: Richard O’Brien, (Bourne Grammar School, Lincolnshire) for Texting in Church, Amelia Penny (South Hampstead High School, London) for Quickening, Charlotte Geater (Northgate High School, Ipswich) for We Beasts and Anna Savory (Fort Pitt Grammar School, Chatham, Kent) for Sestina 102 ;26.

Now in its eighth year, the Christopher Tower poetry competition is one of the most prestigious poetry competitions in the UK, with a reputation for discovering exciting poetry talent.

Alice Howlett, 18, who was shortlisted in last year’s competition, went on to impress best-selling author Alexander McCall Smith, who paid to publish a book of her poetry.

The competition was developed by Tower Poetry at Christ Church to encourage the writing and reading of poetry by young people. Other projects include summer schools, poetry readings and a website which is used as an educational resource in schools.

The winning poems are published on the Tower Poetry website.

Further information can be obtained from info@towerpoetry.org.uk or on 01865 286591.

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The winning poem:
Emily Middleton

The Five Stages
It began long ago, when we pooled blood
like brothers. Respecting the membrane
of our imaginations, we never left
our confines; spent the nights conjuring fire.
Then we found the plough, ablated the fruit;
metastatic, we spread around the globe,
dividing into slaves and enslavers.
We sculpted states, guarded them like eagles,
but we needed leaders, and the weakest
succumbed; laboured till backs cracked, sinews snapped.
A biopsy of their lives showed much was missing;
ascending to the ministry of their own fate,
they rammed down the door, no longer benign,
to carve off chunks of power, form councils.
Men bought and sold their way to the top
whilst others shared the status of amoebas.
Yet there was still a canyon between us.
We struggled like strangers; chose to unite
as comrades with blows, bullets and blood.
The end was brutal: the change was complete.