Collection: W. S. Merwin

W.S. Merwin has been awarded most of the principal prizes in American poetry, including the Pulitzer Prize (twice), the Bollingen Prize and the Tanning Prize and a Lannan Lifetime Achievement Award. Bloodaxe published his Selected Poems in 2007, prior to which his poetry had been unavailable in Britain for over 35 years. As well as being an internationally renowned poet, W. S. Merwin is the author of many classic translations, including editions of Neruda, Dante, The Song of Roland, The Poem of the Cid, and (from Bloodaxe) Sir Gawain and the Green Knight. His latest titles from Bloodaxe are Selected Poems (2007) and The Shadow of Sirius (2009), which won him his second Pulitzer Prize. Neil Astley's anthology Bloodaxe Poetry Introductions: 3 (2007) includes a selection of his poems with extracts from interviews and other prose. Born in New Jersey City in 1927, he taught at several universities, and now lives on the Pacific island of Maui. On July 1st 2010 he was named U.S. Poet Laureate by the Library of Congress.