After 340 years, Scot set to be named as new Poet Laureate

Published on Sunday 26 April 2009 22:40

BOOKMAKERS closed the betting on the choice of Britain's next Poet Laureate yesterday amid reports that Carol Ann Duffy is poised to become the first woman – and the first Scot – to fill the post.

For months, the Scottish-born Ms Duffy and the West Yorkshire poet Simon Armitage have been seen as favourites to succeed Andrew Motion, 56. An announcement is expected when he stands down on Thursday after ten years, the first laureate not to take the post for life.

It was reported yesterday that Ms Duffy has been chosen by the UK government after members of the public were invited to write in with their choices for the first time.

The Department of Culture Media and Sport in London would not confirm the report, saying the choice was being considered by the Queen. Ms Duffy did not return calls yesterday.

A spokesman for William Hill bookmakers said: "Carol Ann has been the most heavily backed contender for the job, and would already cost us a five-figure pay-out, so we've decided to close the book as the decision appears to have been taken."

Ms Duffy, 53, CBE, a poet and playwright, was born in Glasgow but moved away as a child. She went to university in Liverpool and is now director of the writing school at Manchester Metropolitan University.

Works such as Valentine and Mrs Midas have made her one of Britain's most popular poets and she has also collected a series of awards.

With Mr Motion's retirement from the post approaching, there have been public calls for a woman to be named Poet Laureate for the first time, and Ms Duffy topped the favourites list.

The position of Poet Laureate has been held in the past by William Wordsworth and Alfred, Lord Tennyson. Sir Walter Scott was offered it but refused.

Despite having left Scotland at four, Ms Duffy is often claimed as a Scottish poet – she has won three book awards from the Scottish Arts Council and regularly appears at the Edinburgh International Book Festival.

"Carol Ann is a complicated Scot," said Robert Crawford, a poet and professor of modern Scottish literature at St Andrews University. "My sense is she doesn't go around thinking of herself as particularly Scottish, but certainly in her work she has occasionally reflected on that."

In her poem Originally, she describes her brothers crying at a childhood emigration from "the street, the house, the vacant rooms, where we didn't live any more". It was included in a collection of poetry on Scotland.

Prof Crawford described Ms Duffy's work as being "lively, lyrical, sometimes provocative, alert to poetry's capacity even in the 21st century to have a significant public dimension".

Julie Johnstone, of the Scottish Poetry Library, said: "It should go to the right person, and if that person is a Scottish poet, it would be a bonus.

"A lot of her work has an immediate impression on you … There are lots of identifiable voices, and a lot of humour."

EDWIN MORGAN ARCHIVE OPENS

FROM the vintage typewriter on which he tapped out his poems, to a bottle of the absinthe he offered visitors, the life and work of Scotland's national poet is being celebrated in a new collection.

The Edwin Morgan Archive will open today, the poet's 89th birthday, at the Scottish Poetry Library in Edinburgh.

The collection, built up by Morgan's friend and publisher Hamish Whyte, ranges from the first edition of the poet's first book of poems, The Vision of Cathkin Braes, to the chair and desk he worked at.

Morgan is expected at the formal opening, along with culture minister Michael Russell, and Glasgow's poet laureate, Liz Lochhead.