Michael Symmons Roberts was born in 1963 in Preston, Lancashire, UK.
His poetry has won the Costa Poetry Award, the Forward Prize, and the Whitbread Poetry Award, and has also been shortlisted for the Griffin International Poetry Prize and the T.S. Eliot Prize. He has received major awards from the Arts Council and the Society of Authors.
His continuing collaboration with composer James MacMillan has led to two BBC Proms choral commissions, song cycles, music theatre works and operas for the Royal Opera House, Scottish Opera, Boston Lyric Opera and Welsh National Opera. Their WNO commission - ‘The Sacrifice’ - won the RPS Award for opera, and their Royal Opera House / Scottish Opera commission - 'Clemency' - was nominated for an Olivier Award.
His broadcast work includes ‘A Fearful Symmetry’ - for Radio 4 - which won the Sandford St Martin Prize, and ‘Last Words’ commissioned by Radio 4 to mark the first anniversary of 9/11.
He has published two novels, and is Professor of Poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University.
DEATHS OF THE POETS, co-written with Paul Farley, was published by Jonathan Cape in February 2017, followed by the poetry collection MANCUNIA in August 2017. Michael's latest book of poetry, RANSOM, was published in 2021 by Cape and shortlisted for the 2021 T. S. Eliot prize. His non-fiction book QUARTET FOR THE END OF TIME will be published by Jonathan Cape in 2025.
