Paul Muldoon

Paul Muldoon

Paul Muldoon (b 1951, Portadown, County Armagh) started writing poetry at the age of 13. ‘Then, as now, I was fascinated by the power of words to make me see things as if for the first time’ he says. ‘A flea. A forest. A fluorescent light.’

He studied at Queen’s University Belfast: while still a student, his first poetry collection was published by Faber and Faber. Although later accolades include the Pulitzer Prize and the role of Oxford Professor of Poetry, but perhaps the most memorable came in those early days from Seamus Heaney, to whom the young Muldoon showed a batch of poems with the question: what could be done to improve them? ‘Nothing’, Heaney replied.

Since 1987, Muldoon has lived in the United States, where he is a Professor at Princeton University, poetry editor of The New Yorker and the guitarist and lyricist for a band, Wayside Shrines.

Quizzed about One Thousand Things Worth Knowing (Faber, 2014), he admits he finds starting a new collection hard. ‘Each time out, it seems as if one might have discovered the source of the Nile,’ he says. ‘More often than not, it’s a septic tank in one’s own backyard.’

Forward Prizes History:

• 2015 Forward Prizes for Best Collection, shortlisted for One Thousand Things Worth Knowing (Faber & Faber)
• 2003 Forward Prizes for Best Collection, shortlisted for Moy Sand and Graven (Faber & Faber)
• 1998 Forward Prizes for Best Single Poem, shortlisted for ‘Aftermath’ (The Sunday Times)
• 1994 Forward Prizes for Best Collection, shortlisted for The Annals of Chile (Faber and Faber)
• 1994 Forward Prizes for Best Collection, shortlisted for Metamorphoses, Book VI, 1.313-81 (Faber and Faber)