Owen Sheers

Owen Sheers (born 20 September 1974) is a Welsh poet, author, playwright, actor and TV presenter. He is the first writer in residence to be appointed by a national rugby union team.

Life
Sheers was born in Suva, Fiji in 1974 and brought up in Abergavenny, South Wales. He was educated at King Henry VIII comprehensive school, Abergavenny, New College, Oxford, and at the University of East Anglia where he did an MA in Creative Writing. He worked on The Big Breakfast as a researcher.

The winner of an Eric Gregory Award and the 1999 Vogue Young Writer’s Award, his first collection of poetry, The Blue Book (Seren, 2000), -a collection of poems about family, first love and farming life - was short-listed for the Wales Book of the Year and the Forward Poetry Prize Best 1st Collection, 2001. His debut prose work The Dust Diaries (Faber 2004), a non-fiction narrative set in Zimbabwe, was short-listed for the Royal Society of Literature’s Ondaatje Prize and won the Wales Book of the Year 2005.

In 2004 Sheers was Writer in Residence at the Wordsworth Trust, and was selected as one of the Poetry Book Society’s 20 Next Generation Poets. His second collection of poetry, Skirrid Hill (Seren, 2005) won a 2006 Somerset Maugham Award. Unicorns, almost his one man play based on the life and poetry of the WWII poet Keith Douglas was developed by Old Vic, New Voices, and performed by Joseph Fiennes.

His first novel, Resistance, has been translated into ten languages and was shortlisted for the Writer's Guild of Great Britain Best Book Award 2008 and won a 2008 Hospital Club Creative Award. The novel imagines that the D-day landings have failed and Wales been occupied by the Nazis. Sheers had heard about the Auxiliary Units-secret civilian networks which, in the event of an invasion would have formed a British resistance,- whilst working as a tiler in the valleys one summer. Yet the novel focuses not on fighting " but on the uneasy means of survival open to the women who are left behind". The film of the novel, which Owen co-wrote, was released in autumn 2011 and starred Andrea Riseborough. Sheers insisted that the film was shot in and around the Black Mountains.

In 2007 Sheers collaborated with composer Rachel Portman onThe Water Diviner’s Tale, an oratorio for children which was premièred at the Royal Albert Hall for the BBC Proms. In 2007/8 Owen was a Dorothy and Lewis B. Cullman Fellow at the New York Public Library.

In 2009 Sheers published the novella 'White Ravens', a contemporary response to the myth of Branwen Daughter of Llyr, written as part of Seren's series of New Stories from the Mabinogion. He published an anthology of British landscape poetry to accompany his TV series of the same title, A Poet's Guide to Britain.

Sheers has also written journalism and reportage for a variety of publications including Granta, The Guardian, Esquire, GQ, The Times and The Financial Times. He wrote a play for BBC Radio 4 about the WWII poet Alun Lewis: If I Should Go Away. In 2011, Owen wrote the script and novelisation (The Gospel of Us) of The Passion for National Theatre Wales and WildWorks. The Gospel of Us has been re-published by Seren Press. Sheers worked with Michael Sheen co-creating the three-day passion play which unfolded over the Easter weekend of 2011 in Sheen's hometown of Port Talbot. "In Sheers's Neath-flavoured take on the Bible, The Last Supper became pork pies and beer at the Social Club (with music from the Manic Street Preachers), while the Garden of Gethsemane was a scrubby patch of grass on a council estate. " He participated in the Bush Theatre's 2011 project Sixty Six where he wrote a short play The Fair & Tender based upon the Book of Ezekiel in the King James Bible In January 2012, Owen wrote The Two Worlds of Charlie F, a play based on the experiences of wounded soldiers, many of whom also made up the cast of the production, directed by Stephen Rayne and performed at the Theatre Royal Haymarket. His work Pink Mist was broadcast on Radio 4 and presents an elegy about camaraderie in modern warfare as seen through the stories of serving soldiers in Afghanistan, their families and friends.

Rugby union
In December 2011, Owen Sheers became the first writer in residence at the Welsh Rugby Union. Sheers was also a minor rugby player himself at scrum half for Gwent county XV.

Actor & TV Presenter
Sheers has played Wilfred Owen on stage and has presented arts programmes for BBC Wales.

In 2009, he wrote and presented the BBC 4 series about poetry and the British landscape, A Poet's Guide to Britain. He has also presented The Art of the Sea for BBC 4 and several programmes for BBC Radio 3 and 4. In 2008 he presented two episodes of BBC Radio 4's Open Book programme.

Recognition

 * 1999 - Vogue Young Writer’s Award
 * 1999 - Eric Gregory Award
 * 2000 - short-listed for the Wales Book of the Year (for The Blue Book)
 * 2001 - short-listed for Forward Poetry Prize Best 1st Collection
 * 2005 - Wales Book of the Year (for The Dust Diaries)
 * 2006 - Somerset Maugham Award (for Skirrid Hill)
 * 2008 - Hospital Club Creative Award (for Resistance)
 * 2008 - short-listed for Writers' Guild Best Book Award for Resistance
 * 2012 - Winner Amnesty International Freedom of Expression Award for 'The Two Worlds of Charlie F'.
 * 2013 - Hay Medal for Poetry

Publications

 * The Blue Book (2000)
 * The Dust Diaries (2004), a travel memoir through Zimbabwe, following the life of his great great uncle Arthur Shearly Cripps (Welsh Book of the Year)
 * Skirrid Hill (2005) (Somerset Maugham Award)
 * Resistance (2007), His first novel, published by Faber & Faber (Hospital Club Creative Award)
 * White Ravens (2009), The second novella in Seren Books' 'New Stories From The Mabinogion' series
 * A Poet's Guide to Britain (2009) poetry anthology
 * 'The Gospel of Us' (2012) the novella of Sheers's play 'The Passion'
 * 'The Two Worlds of Charlie F.' (2012), Theatre Script
 * 'Calon: A Journey to the Heart of Welsh Rugby' Non-fiction
 * 'Pink Mist', a verse drama (Hay Medal for Poetry 2013)