Philip Gross

Philip Gross (born 1952) is a poet, novelist, playwright and academic, based in Britain.

Philip Gross was born in 1952 in Britain, at Delabole, in north Cornwall, near the sea. He was the only child of Juhan Karl Gross, an Estonian wartime refugee, and Jessie, the daughter of the local village school-master. He grew up and was educated in Plymouth. In junior school he began writing stories, and when in his teens he began writing poetry. He went on to study at Sussex University, where he took his B.A. in English. He worked for a correspondence college and in several libraries (he has a diploma in librarianship). Since the early 80s he has worked as a freelance writer and writing educator, subsequently holding posts in several universities.

In the 1980s he and his first wife, Helen, had a son and a daughter. While living in Bristol he began travelling around schools in Britain as a workshop leader and later he joined Bath Spa University to teach Creative Studies. In 2000 he married his second wife, Zélie. In 2004 he was appointed Professor of Creative Writing at the University of Glamorgan (now the University of South Wales), a position he still holds. In 2007 he received his D. Litt. from the university. He is a Quaker (member of the Society of Friends).

He won the T.S. Eliot Prize for his collection of poems, The Water Table (2009), a Gregory Award (1981) and the National Poetry Competition (1982).

He has been judge for many poetry competitions - in 2014 judging the Hippocrates Prize for Poetry and Medicine, the Manchester Writing for Children Prize 2014, the Magma Poetry Competition and the Medicine Unboxed Creative Prize. In the summer 0f 2015 he was writer in residence at the Poetry on the Move international festival at the University of Canberra.

In 2009 Philip Gross published three books, all of which won major prize. On 18 January 2010, Philip was announced as the 2009 winner of the T.S. Eliot Prize for his collection of poems, The Water Table. (Bloodaxe Books). I Spy Pinhole Eye, from Cinnamon Press, with photographs by Simon Denison, was awarded the Wales Book of the Year prize on 30 June 2010. His collection for children, Off Road to Everywhere (Salt) was awarded the Centre for Literacy in Primary Education prize in 2011. Several of his collections have been Choice or Recommendation of the Poetry Book Society, most recently Love Songs of Carbon in 2015.

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