For a published book of poetry by a Tasmanian writer.

This award is named in honour of renowned Tasmanian poet Tim Thorne (1944–2021).

Winner

Intimate, low-voiced, delicate things by Esther Ottaway (Puncher & Wattmann)

Judges’ comments:

Esther Ottaway’s poetry is at once deeply personal and inventive: she examines poetic form as much as she examines the self, turning over language and repurposing it to express the Intimate, low-voiced, delicate things of the everyday. She distils the complexity of human relation into lyric that cuts straight to the blood and bone. Ottaway displays great agility, technical skill and feeling through these poems. These works are ambitious and often surprising. She reminds us of life that “the daisies stink, but we’re not here/ for comfort”.

• Earth Dwellers by Kristen Lang (Giramondo Publishing)
• Field of Stars by Lyn Reeves (Walleah Press)
• Infernal Topographies by Graeme Miles (University of Western Australia Press)
• Intimate, low-voiced, delicate things by Esther Ottoway (Puncher & Wattmann)

Judges’ comments on the shortlist

From encounters with place, to encounters with others, human and non-human, the works by the poets on this shortlist showcase myriad ways to respond to the world. Attentive to the elastic pull between thought and feeling, these poets bring formal control and deft movement.

In Earth Dwellers Kristen Lang puts us as readers into relationships with many other inhabitants of our planet in poems that are timely and topical, while in Infernal Topographies, Graeme Miles highlights the way a contemporary life can be lived in conversation with much older stories. Esther Ottaway’s Intimate, low-voiced, delicate things speaks to the tenderness of love and loss in all its physicality, while Lyn Reeve’s painterly haiku distil all that a moment can contain.

• Chasing Marie Antoinette all over Paris by Adrienne Eberhard (Black Pepper)
• Earth Dwellers by Kristen Lang (Giramondo Publishing)
• Field of Stars by Lyn Reeves (Walleah Press)
• Infernal Topographies by Graeme Miles (University of Western Australia Press)
• Intimate, low-voiced, delicate things by Esther Ottoway (Puncher & Wattmann)
• Points of Recognition by Jane Williams (Ginninderra Press)
• Slow Walk Home by Young Dawkins (Red Squirrel Press)
• The Jewelled Shillelagh by Duncan Hose (Puncher and Wattmann)
• The Voice of Water by Adrienne Eberhardt, artwork by Sue Lovegrove (Sue Lovegrove and Adrienne Eberhard)
• The Walnut Tree by Tim Slade (Bright South)

Judges’ comments on the longlist

The strength and distinctiveness of Tasmanian poetry is on display here. Ecology and the natural world is especially a thread of interrogation as poets address the interaction of the human and the non-human. From traditional forms to experimental voices, the array of poetry is strong, local and felt.