Kevin Crossley-Holland

Kevin Crossley-Holland was born in 1941 and is a poet, translator from Anglo-Saxon and author for children. After graduating from Oxford University, he became the Gregory Fellow
in Poetry at the University of Leeds and from 1972 to 1977 he lectured in Anglo-Saxon for the Tufts University London programme. During the 1990s, he was also a Fulbright Distinguished Visiting Professor in the midwestern United States.

His writing career began when he became a poetry, fiction, and children’s book editor for Macmillan Publishers. He was later editorial director for Victor Gollancz.

He is known for his poetry, historical novels (including the Arthur trilogy, translated into twenty-five languages), retellings of traditional tales, and translations of Beowulf
and many of the shorter Anglo-Saxon poems.

He is the recipient of many literary awards, most notably the Carnegie Medal in 1985 and the Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize in 2001.

Gravity for Beginners is Kevin Crossley-Holland’s twelfth published poetry collection.

(2021)