Forward Prizes of Poetry 2017 Go to Sinéad Morrissey, Ocean Vuong, & Ian Patterson!

BBC News reports that the Forward Arts Foundation Prizes have been announced! The Felix Dennis Prize for best first collection (£5,000) goes to Ocean Vuong, for Night Sky with Exit Wounds; the best single poem (£1,000) was won by Ian Patterson for "The Plenty of Nothing" (an elegy written for the poet's late wife, the writer Jenny Diski); and Northern Ireland poet Sinéad Morrissey has won the £10,000 Forward Prize for best collection of poetry. 

The Forward's shortlist is here. BBC focuses on Morrissey:

She was awarded the prize at a ceremony in London's Royal Festival Hall for her sixth collection On Balance.

The Forward Prize is one of the most prestigious prizes in poetry, and previous winners include Ted Hughes, Carol Ann Duffy and Seamus Heaney.

The journalist and broadcaster Andrew Marr chaired the 2017 judging panel.

He said the poems in On Balance were full of energy.

"This is writing that successfully comes right up to the edge, again and again.

"We were taken by the openness, the capacity and the exuberance of this work.

"On Balance is a collection that readers will keep, and go back to for a long time to come."

Congratulations to the winners!