About Arji
Arji Manuelpillai is a poet, performer and creative facilitator based in London.
His work has appeared in Poetry Review, The Rialto and Bath Magg, and has been shortlisted for the National Poetry Prize (2021), the Out-Spoken Prize and the Winchester Poetry Prize (2021). He is a Jerwood/Arvon mentee (mentored by Hannah Lowe) and has received commissions from the Science Museum, the National Memorial Arboretum and the Princess of Wales.
Arji’s debut pamphlet ‘Mutton Rolls' was published with Out-Spoken Press in 2020 and his latest book ‘Improvised Explosive Device’ was released in the Autumn of 2022. This highly acclaimed book was noted in The Telegraph’s Top 20 poetry books of the year, as well as in The Guardian’s best recent poetry section. It was also the Winter PBS selection and was nominated for the Derek Walcott Prize.
“His poems are funny, irreverent, hugely affecting - you’ll rush after him, then find he’s stopped, spun on his heel and you’re face-to-face with his good-natured grin.”
– Wayne Holloway Smith, T.S Eliot Nominee
“His voice is entirely his own, full of pizzazz, and his mastery of narrative and syntactic jump-cuts gives great excitement to his verse. He is adept at pointing at enormous themes through small incidents”
— Jonathan Edwards (Costa Prize Winner)
