July 22nd, 2009
Cilla McQueen has been named National Library New Zealand Poet Laureate for 2009-2011. McQueen is the second person to receive the award, taking over from the 2007 appointee, Aucklander Michele Leggott. The National Library award replaced the Te Mata Estate Poet Laureate award, which celebrated five poet laureates, including Hone Tuwhare and Bill Manhire. The poet laureate receives a minimum of $70,000 over two years to fund activities to promote poetry. McQueen has 10 poetry collections and a CD, and won three New Zealand Book Awards, a Fulbright Visiting Writer’s Fellowship, a Goethe Institute Scholarship to Berlin and two Burns Fellowships at Otago University.
Smartish Pace