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T S Eliot Prize-winning poet Philip Gross has won the Wales Book of the Year for I Spy Pinhole Eye, despite no unanimous agreement from the judges.
He was awarded the £10,000 prize last night (30th June) for the Cinnamon Press collection, which was written to accompany pinhole photography by Simon Denison.
‘Anyone who thinks literary prizes are stitch-ups should have been in the room with us this afternoon," said judge James Hawes. "It was a close-fought battle with no unanimous agreement in the end so the winner is on a 2-1 majority verdict. We hope that Philip will relish the fact that this was a real five-set tussle not a straight sets walkover.
"I am personally delighted that we are making this award to a writer who his other recent collection confirms at the very top of his game."
Salt poet Richard Marggraf Turley was awarded the public-voted Media Wales People’s Choice Prize for Wan Hu’s Flying Chair.
The winner of the Welsh-language award, who also received a £10,000 prize, was John Davies for Cymru: Y 100 lle i’w gweld cyn marw (Y Lolfa). The Welsh language Readers’ prize went to Manon Steffan Ros for Fel Aderyn (Y Lolfa).
Gross won the T S Eliot prize earlier this year for his collection The Water Table, published by Bloodaxe.