Foyle Young Poets 2023 Award Ceremony at the Sam Wanamaker Playhouse, Shakespeare's Globe

The Poetry Society has announced the top 15 winners and 85 commended poets in the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award 2023 at a special celebration at Shakespeare’s Globe, London. National Poetry Day (5th October 2023) was the perfect occasion to reveal the latest winners of this leading award for young writers. Young poets travelled from all across the UK to take to the stage of the Globe’s Sam Wanamaker Playhouse with The Poetry Society. Friends, family, educators and literary experts heard reflections from the judges, listened to readings from the Foyle Award’s top 15 writers and celebrated the future of poetry. In a full day of activities, the 2024 Poetry by Heart poetry speaking competition was also launched at the Globe earlier the same morning. Run by The Poetry Society and generously supported by the Foyle Foundation, this has been an exciting 25th year for the Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award. Since 1998, the Award has been finding, celebrating and supporting the very best young poets from across the UK and internationally. The Foyle Young Poets of the Year Award is firmly established as one of the leading competitions in the world for young poets aged between 11 and 17 years old. An amazing 15,800 poems from 6,600 young people were entered. Young people from 119 countries entered the competition from as far afield as Romania, Trinidad and Tobago, Vietnam and New Zealand, as well as the four corners of the UK. Entries were received from every postcode area in England, and from throughout Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland.