Jacob Polley

Jacob Polley (born 1975) is an English poet.

Life
Polley was born in Carlisle, Cumbria.

He graduated with an M.A. in Creative Writing from Lancaster University in 1997.

Polley was Visiting Fellow Commoner in Creative Arts at Trinity College, Cambridge, 2005-07. He was the 2011 Arts Queensland Poet-in-Residence.

Recognition
Polley won an Eric Gregory Award, and the BBC Radio 4/Arts Council ‘First Verse’ Award, in 2002. His first book, The Brink (Picador 2003), was a Poetry Book Society Choice, and went on to be shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot Prize, the Forward Prize and the John Llewellyn Rhys prize.

Polley was selected as one of the Next Generation Poets in 2004. His second poetry book, Little Gods (2006), was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation. His third, The Havocs (2012), was shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot Prize in 2012.

Polley’s first novel, Talk of the Town, was published in June 2009 by Picador. The book went on to win the 2010 Somerset Maugham Award and was also shortlisted for the Desmond Elliott Prize.

Poetry

 * Salvage. Northern Lights, 2000.
 * The Brink. London: Picador, 2003.
 * In the Return. Darlington Borough Council, 2005.
 * Little Gods. London: Picador, 2006.
 * The Havocs. London: Picador, 2012.

Fiction

 * Talk of the Town (novel). London: Picador, 2009.

Film-writing

 * Flickerman and the Ivory-skinned Woman (directed by Ian Fenton)