All photos courtesy of CLPE Press release

Performance poet and playwright Joseph Coelho has been awarded £1,000 as winner of the CLiPPA 2015 for his first solo collection of poems Werewolf Club Rules!, illustrated by John O’Leary, published by Frances Lincoln. Joseph will also receive a specially bound copy of Werewolf Club Rules! designed and hand bound by bookbinder Mark Cockram.

Joseph is a performance poet and playwright. He has written plays for the Polka Theatre, the Lyric, Hammersmith, and the Unicorn Theatre. He performs his poetry shows with the UK’s top performance poetry organisation, Apples and Snakes, visiting venues across the UK. Joseph’s poems have appeared in many anthologies, including Green Glass Beads by Jacqueline Wilson and The Works 6, edited by Pie Corbett, but Werewolf Club Rules! is his first solo collection.

Roger McGough, Poet and Chair of the CLiPPA 2015 judges praised the winning collection: “The shortlist this year was very strong and very diverse, it showed the real range of poetic writing that is available. Joseph’s collection showcases his work as a fresh new voice in children’s poetry. The book is a wonderful mixture of lyrical verse, personal experience, humour and insight. His delight in language, ability to tell everyday stories and use of comedy and pathos are what made this book our winner. ”

The Centre for Literacy in Primary Education runs the annual Poetry Award which encourages and celebrates outstanding poetry published for children. It is the only award in the UK for published children’s poetry.

Watched by a packed house of poets, educators, publishers and media and schools, children taking part in the inaugural CLiPPA shadowing scheme took to the stage with passionate performances of their favourite shortlisted poems.

Louise Johns-Shepherd, Chief Executive, CLPE said: “In our work with thousands of schools and teachers across the country, we see again and again the importance of poetry. Poetry provides the gateway for so many young readers and writers in their journey towards becoming literate – delighting, supporting and engaging children as they build a love of literature…. This is why we put poetry at the heart of everything we do at CLPE. The Poetry Award, the poetry shadowing scheme and our Poetryline website are essential to our work, and to our conception of improving literacy in our nation’s schools.”

More than 1000 children from 40 schools took part in the first year of the Shadowing Scheme submitting between them more than 50 films of students performing their favourite poems from the shortlist. The winning performers were invited to the National Theatre for the day to meet the shortlisted poets and take part in specially planned theatre workshops run by the National Theatre.

The day culminated in The Poetry Show where the winners performed on stage alongside the shortlisted poets before the CLiPPA 2015 winner announcement.

The judging panel was chaired by Roger McGough and the other members of the panel were:

 Tony Bradman – children’s author and Chair of the Siobhan Dowd Trust

 Allie Esiri – Creative director of iLiterature Ltd, iF Poems and The Love Book literary apps and books

 Charlotte Hacking – CLPE Learning Programmes Leader

 Tony Mitton – poet and CLiPPA 2014 winner for Wayland

The full CLiPPA 2015 Shortlist:

 Mandy Coe (editor): Let in the Stars, illustrated by The Manchester School of Art, The

Manchester Writing School, Manchester Metropolitan University

 Georgie Horrell, Aisha Spencer and Morag Styles (editors): Give the Ball to the Poet. A New

Anthology of Caribbean Poetry, illustrated by Jane Ray, Commonwealth EducationTrust

 Hilda Offen: Blue Balloons and Rabbit Ears, Troika Books

 Rachel Rooney: My Life as a Goldfish and other poems, illustrated by Ellie Jenkins, Frances Lincoln

Performance films and teaching materials for all the shortlisted works are available for free on

www.poetryline.org.uk

The Centre for Literacy in Primary Education works nationally to raise achievement in literacy. It is an independent charity with a national and international reputation for excellence in the fields of language, literacy, assessment and creative learning.

https://www.clpe.org.uk/news/47

The last time a poetry collection was shortlisted in the children’s section of Costa prize was in 1999 when it was still called the Whitbread Book Awards. This year, out of 91 nominations for the Carnegie prize, only one was for a poetry collection, and that book didn’t make the longlist. (Any professional librarian can nominate a book and it is added to the nominations.)

Certainly children’s poetry doesn’t win these prizes, even on the very rare occasion it is shortlisted. Why is that?

If you read newspaper summer and Christmas book round-ups, or lists of top 10/50/100 book recommendations, they hardly ever include poetry. If you go into bookshops and libraries, do you see signs for children’s poetry? Not many? Is it perhaps because in many bookshops poetry is likely to be found under signs which say “Fairy Tales and Gifts”, “Jokes”, “Rhymes and Giggles” and “Hobbies”? Do you see much stock of children’s poetry? No? Why is that?

Booksellers say to me that there aren’t many poetry books being published; book consultants and journalists tell me that they aren’t told about new children’s poetry books when they are published. It seems that the chain between children’s poetry and its audience has many broken links. Some of the broken links are caused by fear.

Children’s poets visit schools and we know that children love poetry. They respond enthusiastically when it’s read to them, they love the wordplay, rhythms and rhymes, and they write their own fantastic poems in workshops.

A poet who visits schools can expect their highest sales from children who buy their own signed and dedicated copies. So in schools, the chain isn’t broken between poetry and its audience.

via Why is children’s poetry so invisible? | Children’s books | The Guardian.