Poet 'astonished' to receive King's Gold medal

A poet said he is "astonished" to have his work recognised by royalty and to now feature among literary names he has admired for years.

Michael Laskey, 81, was awarded the King's Gold Medal for Poetry for 2025, an accolade established by King George V in 1933 and awarded for excellence in the field.

Laskey, who was born in Lichfield in Staffordshire and now lives in Suffolk, saw his first publication, Cloves of Garlic, in 1988 become a joint winner of the Poetry Business pamphlet competition.

"I was completely astonished and am still finding it hard to believe," he said.

During his career, Laskey published six full poetry collections, with one collection, The Tightrope Wedding, published in 1999, shortlisted for the TS Eliot Prize.

However, this is not the first time he has been recognised by royalty after being awarded a British Empire Medal for services to Contemporary Poetry in 2015.

He said: "I never imagined my poems would receive such extraordinary public recognition or that my name could ever appear on the same list as some of the poets whose work I've looked up to and loved for years."

Previous recipients of the medal include Ted Hughes, John Agard, Philip Larkin and last year's winner George Szirtes.

Poet Laureate Simon Armitage said: "Michael is an incredibly gifted poet and is highly deserving of the King's Gold Medal for Poetry.

"Reading through [Laskey's] Collected Poems, I was struck by how deceptively simple the poems are: apparently effortless, domestic, calm in voice and clear in their descriptions and observations — yet so often, in fact almost always, deeply moving, with last lines that cause an involuntary intake of breath, a wobble of the heart, or shiver of the spine."

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