Ahren Warner was born in 1986 and grew up in Lincolnshire. He lived in Paris whilst writing his doctorate and now lives in London. His first collection, Confer (Bloodaxe Books, 2011), was both a Poetry Book Society Recommendation and shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection. He was awarded an Eric Gregory Award in 2010 and an Arts Foundation Fellowship in 2012. His second collection, Pretty, will be published by Bloodaxe in June 2013 and is also a Poetry Book Society Recommendation.
‘Warner’s poems, by turns funny and disconcerting and patently accomplished, set out their individual programme as originally as in any debut collection for some time. As with the first books of Thom Gunn, Ted Hughes or Craig Raine, it is immediately clear that something different is going on’ – Alan Brownjohn, Sunday Times.
‘… pizzazz, wit and – astonishing at his age – both technical assurance and a genuinely integrated humanity’ – Fiona Sampson, Independent.
‘Witty as well as erudite… Warner rows his own coracle, with his own deft motion’ – Carol Rumens, Poetry Review