Brotherton Poetry Prize

About the Prize

The Brotherton Poetry Prize is generously supported by the Charles Brotherton Trust.

The winner receives £1,000 and the opportunity to develop their creative practice with Poetry@Leeds. Four runners-up each receive £200. The poems of the eventual five shortlisted poets will be published as an anthology by Carcanet Press.

Brotherton Poetry Prize 2025 Winner: 

Tom Pyle

Tom is a writer from Lancaster who is currently based in Zagreb, where he works as a teacher. He started writing poems during the pandemic and has spent more and more time doing so over the last six years. In 2024 he began studying for an MA at the Centre for New Writing in Manchester, graduating in 2025. During this period, he was an editor of the Manchester Anthology, showcasing a selection of poetry, fiction and non-fiction from writers on the programme.

Brotherton Poetry Prize 2025 Shortlistees: 

Jo Bratten

Originally from the midwest of America, Jo moved to the UK in the late '90s and completed a PhD at St Andrews and now lives in London, where she teaches English. Her poetry has been widely published in the UK and Ireland, with recent work in Bad Lilies, The London Magazine, Magma, Perverse and Poetry London. She won second prize in The Rialto Nature and Place Competition in 2023 and her pamphlet, Climacteric, was published in 2022. She is poetry editor at The Interpreter’s House.

A. K. Ellis

A. K. Ellis' poems have been published in Ash, the Mays Anthology, the Fish Anthology, and His Father’s Breath. She has been shortlisted for the Bridport and Winchester poetry prizes, among others. She lives and works in Oxford, by a river that sometimes comes inside the house.

Paul McMahon

From Belfast, Paul McMahon’s chapbook, Bourdon, was published by Southword Editions. He was awarded The Keats-Shelley Poetry Prize by Carol Ann Duffy. Currently nominated for the Forward Poetry Prize by The Poetry Society, Paul’s other poetry awards include first prizes in The Moth International, The Fingal, The Plaza, The Westival International, The Nottingham Open, The Gloucester, The Golden Pen, and The Listowel Writers’ Week Poetry Collection Prize. His poems have appeared in The Poetry Review, Poetry News, Rialto, London Magazine, Threepenny Review, Southword, Irish Times, The Best New British and Irish Poets and elsewhere.

Alison Tanik

Alison Tanik is a poet/performer from the Midlands who came to writing in her fifties. Her poetry has won prizes in both the States and the UK, and has been shortlisted for (among others) the Oxford Poetry Prize, the Aurora Prize, the Bridport Prize, the Creative Futures Award (three times!), and an array of Mslexia prizes (in poetry, flash fiction and pamphlet categories). Her theatre work was long-listed for the Richard Jenkins Commission. She is a Nine Arches Dynamo Poet for 2025-2026; the judge of this year's River Heron Poetry Prize in America, and a current Pushcart nominee. She is in the first year of her PhD at the Manchester Writing School, looking at archival silences.

2025 Judges

Simon Armitage – Poet Laureate & Professor of Poetry

Kimberly Campanello – Professor of Poetry & Director of Poetry@Leeds

John Whale – Professor of Romantic Literature and former Director of Poetry@Leeds

Zaffar Kunial– Lecturer in Creative Writing & Douglas Caster Cultural Fellow 2019-2021

Anthony Vahni Capildeo – Douglas Caster Cultural Fellow 2017-2019

Helen Mort – Douglas Caster Cultural Fellow 2014-2016

Emma Trott – Lecturer in Contemporary Literature

Matthew Treherne – Professor of Italian Literature and Pro-Dean for Research & Innovation for the Faculty of Arts, Humanities and Cultures

Previous Winners

Dillon Jaxx, Lauren Pope, and Dane Holt

Previous Shortlistees

Kim Deyn, Lucy Dixcart, Will Fleming, Pete Green, Helen Kay, Majella Kelly, Jam Kraprayoon, Maeve Henry, Lucy Holme, Isabella Mead, Adam Panichi, Robyn Maree Pickins