Simon Armitage was born in Marsden, West Yorkshire in 1963. Since the publication of his first book Zoom (Bloodaxe, 1989) he has become one of the most admired poets of his generation. He has a BA in Geography from Portsmouth Polytechnic and an MA in Psychology from the University of Manchester. He has worked as a probation officer, shelf stacker, Radio 1 disc jockey, lathe operator, lecturer, reviewer and broadcaster, presenting Radio 4's poetry series Stanza. As well as poems he writes song lyrics, plays and TV and radio scripts.

Bibliography

Armitage's poetry books include Zoom (Bloodaxe, 1989), Kid (Faber, 1992), Book of Matches (Faber, 1993), The Dead Sea Poems (Faber, 1995), Moon Country (Faber, 1996) and Cloud Cuckoo Land (Faber, 1997). His most recent publication is a prose piece entitled All Points North (Viking, 1998).