Simon Armitage

Overview

Known for
Acting
Gender
Other
Birthday
May 26, 1963 (62 years old)

Simon Armitage

Known For

Ted Hughes: Stronger Than Death
1h 29m
Movie 2015

Ted Hughes: Stronger Than Death

Documentary exploring Ted Hughes, one of the greatest poets of the 20th century, focusing on how his life story influenced his work and vision.

Great Poets: In Their Own Words
1h 38m
Movie 2014

Great Poets: In Their Own Words

A journey into the BBC archives unearthing glorious performances and candid interviews from some of Britain's greatest poets.

Dylan Thomas: A Poet's Guide
0h 58m
Movie 2014

Dylan Thomas: A Poet's Guide

Famous for his womanising, drinking and tragic death, Dylan Thomas is the rock star of 20th-century poetry. But for Welsh poet Owen Sheers, his tempestuous life often obscures the power of his poetry. Sheers takes us on a journey that reveals Dylan Thomas as a visionary and a craftsman.

Speeches That Shook the World
1h 0m
Movie 2013

Speeches That Shook the World

Speech-making is the art of persuasion. Well-honed rhetoric appeals not just to the mind, but to the heart and, deeper down, in the guts. Examining the speeches that provoked radical change, surprised pundits or shocked listeners, poet Simon Armitage dissects what makes a perfect speech. Simon gets the inside story behind some of the famous speeches of the modern age, talking to Tony Blair's speechwriter, to Earl Spencer on his controversial address at his sister's funeral and the woman who challenged the rioters in Hackney. We hear how Peter Tatchell confronted the BNP, Paul Boateng on how Enoch Powell's divisive speech personally affected him as a child, and Colonel Tim Collins, whose charge was to motivate his troops on the eve of the Iraq war. Simon discusses the nuts and bolts of speech writing with Vincent Franklin, aka the blue-sky thinking guru Stuart Pearson from The Thick of It, and gets tips on powerful delivery from actor Charles Dance.

Simon Armitage Writing Poems
0h 30m
Movie 2012

Simon Armitage Writing Poems

Poet Simon Armitage explains how he is going behind the scenes of some of his poems to help readers understand and visualize how they are created.

The Pendle Witch Child
1h 0m
Movie 2011

The Pendle Witch Child

The extraordinary story of the most disturbing witch trial in British history and the key role played in it by one nine-year-old girl. Jennet Device, a beggar-girl from Pendle in Lancashire, was the star witness in the trial in 1612 of her own mother, her brother, her sister and many of her neighbours and, thanks to her chilling testimony, they were all hanged.

Gods and Monsters: Homer's Odyssey
1h 0m
Movie 2010

Gods and Monsters: Homer's Odyssey

Virginia Woolf said that Homer's epic poem the Odyssey was 'alive to every tremor and gleam of existence'. Following the magical and strange adventures of warrior king Odysseus, inventor of the idea of the Trojan horse, the poem can claim to be the greatest story ever told. Now British poet Simon Armitage goes on his own Greek adventure, following in the footsteps of one of his own personal heroes. Yet Simon ponders the question of whether he even likes the guy.

The Making of King Arthur
0h 58m
Movie 2010

The Making of King Arthur

Poet Simon Armitage traces the evolution of the Arthurian legend through the literature of the medieval age and reveals that King Arthur is not the great national hero he is usually considered to be. He's a fickle and transitory character who was appropriated by the Normans to justify their conquest, he was cuckolded when French writers began adapting the story and it took Thomas Malory's masterpiece of English literature, Le Mort d'Arthur, to restore dignity and reclaim him as the national hero we know today.

Biography

Simon Robert Armitage, CBE, FRSL is an English poet, playwright and novelist who was appointed Poet Laureate on 10 May 2019. He is also professor of poetry at the University of Leeds and succeeded Geoffrey Hill as Oxford Professor of Poetry when he was elected to the four year part time appointment from 2015–2019.

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