Young poets are often the best

Philip Hensher: Young poets are often the best
Published: 20 July 2007

Byron said, after the publication of the first cantos of Childe Harolde's Pilgrimage in 1812, that he woke and found himself famous. The audience for poetry is not what it was in the Regency, but Luke Kennard would still have had a little taste of that when he woke on Tuesday morning to find himself on the shortlist for the Forward poetry prize for his collection, The Harbour Beyond the Movie. The Forward is the most admired and important of British poetry prizes, and Kennard, at 26, is the youngest poet ever to have been shortlisted.  continue...