Josephine Hart, chair of the final judges, said: ”Out of a personal tragedy, Christopher Reid has written a masterwork which has universal power. Austere, beautiful and moving – we all felt this is a book we would want everyone to read. Packed full of unforgettable lines, A Scattering is a remarkable piece.”
Lucinda Gane, Christopher Reid's wife, died in October 2005. A Scattering is his tribute to her and consists of four poetic sequences, the first written during her illness, and the other three at intervals after her death.
Christopher Reid is the author of a number of books of poems including, most recently, For and After (2003) and Mr Mouth (2006). Between 1991 and 1999, he was Poetry Editor at Faber and Faber, and worked with Ted Hughes on such books as Tales from Ovid and Birthday Letters. In 2007, he was appointed Professor in Creative Writing at the University of Hull.
