We are delighted to share the news that the shortlist for the 2024 Seamus Heaney Poetry Prize for a First Collection includes two Carcanet poets! Congratulations to Charlotte Eichler for being shortlisted with Swimming Between Islands, which was published in February 2023, and to Tristram Fane Saunders for making the shortlist with Before We Go Any Further, which came out in June 2023.

The First Collection Poetry Prize is awarded to a writer whose first full collection has been published in the preceding year, by a UK or Ireland-based publisher. The winner receives £5,000. The winner will be announced during the Seamus Heaney Centre’s annual Poetry Summer School, at the Award Night readings in June 2024.

Of the shortlist announcement, Nick Laird, Seamus Heaney Professor of Poetry at Queen's, and judge of the Poetry Prize said: 'All three judges were delighted at the standard of the debuts submitted this year. The dazzling books that made the shortlist are different in kind but all insist on taking the world on their own terms, and refuse received notions in order to construct their own authority. We were knocked out by the integrity of these poets’ voices, and it’s genuinely heartening to see the art in such good shape.'

Many congratulations to all the shortlisted poets and publishers, and good luck to Charlotte and Tristram!

Read more on the prize website here.