Costa Prize winning poet Jonathan Edwards has been appointed as the new editor of Poetry Wales. Currently celebrating 55 years of publication, Poetry Wales‘ first issue edited by Edwards is due to be published at the end of January 2020.
Jonathan Edwards is the winner of Wales Book of Year Wales Arts Review People’s Choice 2019 and the Costa Poetry Prize 2014. His first collection was named one of booksellers’ top 25 poetry books of the last 25 years, taking its place amongst collections by Maya Angelou and Alice Oswald.
On his appointment, Edwards said, “It is a huge honour to be appointed as the new editor of Poetry Wales. I am a very proud Welshman and, when one looks at the lineage of poets our country has produced, I believe that we are the most exciting poetry nation in the world. Poetry Wales is one of the most inclusive, outward-looking poetry magazines there is, and it will be an honour to continue the work of my predecessors. I want every issue to be a party, a celebration – hey, a riot! – and I want it to be about all of us, our gorgeous poetry community, stretching as it does from Denbigh to Gdansk, from Bala to Brussels, from Cwmcarn to Kolkata. I heartily welcome submissions of poems and ideas for articles for the magazine. Poetry needs you! Let’s make something wonderful.”