The British poet is praised by the jury for ‘speaking truth to power – forcefully, fearlessly and beautifully’
Hailed by judges for speaking “truth to power – forcefully, fearlessly, and beautifully”, the British poet and journalist James Fenton has been named as winner of this year’s PEN Pinter prize.
The award takes its criteria from the late writer Harold Pinter’s Nobel speech, in which he spoke of his belief that, as citizens, it is “mandatory” to cast an “unflinching, unswerving” gaze upon the world and show a “fierce intellectual determination … to define the real truth of our lives and our societies”.
“If such a determination is not embodied in our political vision we have no hope of restoring what is so nearly lost to us – the dignity of man,” said Pinter in 2005.
The jury for this year’s prize included Pinter’s widow Antonia Fraser, as well as Susannah Clapp, Sam Leith, Hisham Matar and president of English PEN Maureen Freely. It has previously been awarded to writers including Salman Rushdie, Tom Stoppard and Carol Ann Duffy. The jury particularly highlighted Fenton’s poem Blood and Lead – a stirring indictment of war which opens: “Listen to what they did. / Don’t listen to what they said. / What was written in blood / Has been set up in lead” – as an example of his “unflinching” gaze upon the world.
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The award takes its criteria from the late writer Harold Pinter’s Nobel speech, in which he spoke of his belief that, as citizens, it is “mandatory” to cast an “unflinching, unswerving” gaze upon the world and show a “fierce intellectual determination … to define the real truth of our lives and our societies”.
“If such a determination is not embodied in our political vision we have no hope of restoring what is so nearly lost to us – the dignity of man,” said Pinter in 2005.
The jury for this year’s prize included Pinter’s widow Antonia Fraser, as well as Susannah Clapp, Sam Leith, Hisham Matar and president of English PEN Maureen Freely. It has previously been awarded to writers including Salman Rushdie, Tom Stoppard and Carol Ann Duffy. The jury particularly highlighted Fenton’s poem Blood and Lead – a stirring indictment of war which opens: “Listen to what they did. / Don’t listen to what they said. / What was written in blood / Has been set up in lead” – as an example of his “unflinching” gaze upon the world.
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