Poetry for mind, body and soul: shortlists announced for the 2017 Hippocrates Prize

« Creativity, insight, and skill: the shortlist for the 2017 Hippocrates Young Poets Prize

Poets from Australia, Canada, Ireland, Singapore, the USA and the UK are among finalists for major awards in this year’s Hippocrates Prize for Poetry and Medicine.

Shortlisted in the Health Profession category are Kathy D’Arcy from Cork, Ireland, who has worked as a doctor and youth worker, Iora Dawes, from Stafford, who has worked as a medical social worker, and respiratory physician Andrew Dimitri from Sydney, Australia, who is also a field doctor for the international humanitarian organisation Médecins Sans Frontières.

Competing for the top award in the Open category are poets Claire Collison from London, England, Rosie Jackson from Somerset in England and Alisha Kaplan from Toronto in Canada.

In the running for the £500 Young Poet Award are: from the USA, Rachel Litchman, Michigan, Joyce Zhou, Illinois, and Erin O'Malley, Pennsylvania; from the UK Roberta Maia Sher, London and Izzy Wythe, Oundle; and from Singapore Vernon Yian.

The judges also agreed a record twenty-nine commendations in the Health Professional category, reflecting the high quality of entries, with a further sixteen poems commended in the Open category, from poets from around the world: the UK, Ireland, the USA, Canada, Australia, Singapore, the Philippines and Switzerland.

The winners will be announced at Harvard on Saturday 6th May at an international symposium on poetry and medicine. There is still time to register for the Awards ceremony and the symposium on 6th May and for the associated event at the Boston Museum of Fine Art on ‘Poetry and Training the Eye’ on Friday 5th May.

The Hippocrates Prize attracts health professionals and established poets alike, with entries this year from over 30 countries. This year, themes have ranged from illness in children to recovery from depression and from cancer to treating victims in conflict zones.

The judges for the 2017 Hippocrates Awards are paediatrician and Emmy Award-winning producer of ER, Neal Baer; celebrated poet and Boylston Professor of Rhetoric and Oratory at Harvard, Jorie Graham; Scottish Makar (National Poet) and novelist, Jackie Kay; and New York Professor of Psychiatry and poet, Owen Lewis. The Young Poet category (for writers aged fourteen to eighteen) was judged by New York writer and teacher Maya Catherine Popa.
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