Patience Agbabi facts for kids

Quick facts for kids Patience Agbabi FRSL
Born	1965 (age 59–60) London, England
Nationality	British
Alma mater	Pembroke College, Oxford University of Sussex
Occupation	Poet and performer

Patience Agbabi (born in 1965) is a British poet and performer. She is known for her powerful spoken word poetry. Her poems often talk about modern topics. She uses traditional poetry styles in new ways.

Patience Agbabi has described herself as "bicultural." This means she connects with two different cultures. She is also known for exploring themes of race and identity in her poetry. People praise her for combining literature and live performance. Her work moves easily between different cultures and voices. In 2017, she became a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature. This is a special honor for writers.

Growing Up and Learning

Patience Agbabi was born in London, England. Her parents were from Nigeria. When she was young, a white English family fostered her. At age 12, she moved from Sussex to North Wales. She grew up in a town called Colwyn Bay.

She went to Pembroke College, Oxford to study English. Later, she earned a master's degree. This was in Creative Writing from the University of Sussex in 2002. That same year, she started teaching creative writing. She taught at the University of Wales, Cardiff.

Poetry and Live Shows

Patience Agbabi started performing in 1995. She joined a group called Atomic Lip in London clubs. Some people called them "poetry's first pop group." They mixed live shows with video in their "Quadrophonix" tour.

From 1995 to 1998, she worked on a show called FO(U)R WOMEN. She performed with Adeola Agbebiyi and Dorothea Smartt. They first performed at the Institute of Contemporary Arts. Patience Agbabi has said that Janis Joplin and Carol Ann Duffy influenced her. She also gets ideas from Chaucer and modern music. Her poem "Eat Me" shows her childhood love for cake.

Early Poetry Collections

Her first book of poems, R.A.W., came out in 1995. These poems talked about her experiences. They covered city life and issues of race. The style of these poems was like rap music.

Her next book, Transformatrix, was published in 2000. This collection commented on modern Britain. It took ideas from popular music. Transformatrix also had her first version of a story from Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales. She reimagined the Wife of Bath as "Mrs. Alice Ebi Bafa" from Nigeria.

In 2008, Agbabi released Bloodshot Monochrome. This book highlighted social and political topics. It looked at moments in time through the eyes of old authors. One reviewer said it showed her views on life in many places. Poet Carol Rumens noted that Agbabi often uses poetry to talk with the past.

Telling Tales and Performances

From 2009 to 2010, Patience Agbabi was the Canterbury Laureate. She received a grant to write a new poetry collection. This collection was also based on Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales.

The book, called Telling Tales, was published in 2014. It retold each story from Chaucer's Middle English work. It gave a modern twist to the characters and poems. Her unique poetic style redefined British literary traditions. Other poets, like Simon Armitage, praised the book. He called them "the liveliest versions of Chaucer you're likely to read."

Patience Agbabi still performs Telling Tales today. She presents it as a performance-poetry show. She tours literature festivals and libraries across the UK. She performs tales like "The Wife of Bafa."

She has also performed internationally. She toured Namibia, the Czech Republic, Zimbabwe, Germany, and Switzerland. She took part in Modern Love, a spoken-word tour. This tour explored love and modern relationships.

Her poetry has been on TV and radio. It was on the Channel 4 series Litpop in 1998. She also appeared on the children's show Blue Peter in 1999. She has contributed to several poetry books. These include Jubilee Lines (2012), which celebrated Queen Elizabeth II's 60th anniversary. She also contributed to Refugee Tales (2016). This book shared stories from people held at Gatwick airport.

Patience Agbabi has taught and led workshops. She has been a poet-in-residence at many places. These include Oxford Brookes University and Eton College. In 2018, she was a writer-in-residence at the Brontë Parsonage Museum.

Awards and Special Honors

• In 1997, her first poetry book, R.A.W., won the Excelle Literary Award.
• In 2000, BBC Radio 4 asked her to write a poem for National Poetry Day.
• In 2004, she was named one of the Poetry Book Society's Next Generation poets. This list highlights exciting new poets.
• In 2010, she became the Canterbury Poet Laureate for the Canterbury Festival.
• In 2015, her book Telling Tales was shortlisted for the 2014 Ted Hughes Award. This award is for new poetry work.
• In 2017, Patience Agbabi was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.

Her Books

• R.A.W., Gecko Press (1995)
• Transformatrix, Canongate Books (2000)
• Bloodshot Monochrome, Canongate (2008)
• Telling Tales, Canongate (2014)
• The Infinite, Canongate (2020)

Books She Contributed To

• Carol Ann Duffy, ed., Jubilee Lines (London: Faber & Faber, 2012)
• Sasha Dugdale, ed., Best British Poetry 2012 (Cromer: Salt, 2012)
• Helen Ivory, ed., In Their Own Words (Cromer: Salt, 2012)
• Rob Pope, ed., Studying English Language and Literature: An Introduction and Companion (Oxford: Routledge, 2012)
• Tom Chivers, Adventures in Form (London: Penned in the Margins, 2012)
• Refugee Tales (Manchester: Comma Press, 2016)
• Margaret Busby, ed., New Daughters of Africa (Myriad Editions, 2019)