Stricker wins 2025 Peter Porter Poetry Prizea
Meredith Stricker was awarded the 2025 Peter Porter Poetry Prize, run by the Australian Book Review (ABR) and worth $6000, at a ceremony in Melbourne last night.
ABR outgoing editor Peter Rose played the evening’s MC, taking the opportunity to speak about the prize’s namesake and to invite attendees to listen to readings of some of Porter’s poetry. Also reading were literary critic and essayist Morag Fraser, who is working on a biography of Porter; and poet, academic and 2025 judge Paul Kane. Four of the five shortlisted poets were in attendance at the event, and provided an introduction and a reading of their nominated poems. Stricker, a resident of Carmel in the US, was not able to attend the ceremony. Readings of all shortlisted poems by their writers are available on the ABR website.
Stricker’s poem, ‘The Vastness of What Poetry Can Do’, was chosen from a shortlist of five, which in turn was chosen from 1171 entries from 29 countries. The judges noted the all-female shortlist, and said of the winner: ‘That this is the most expansive poem on the shortlist seems inevitable, given its titular subject […] The five eclectic epigraphs (beginning with Wallace Stevens, who might have conceived the title), and the references throughout, hint at the poet’s impressive range of influences, but this spacious and elegant poem – “stubborn, forlorn, resplendent” – is entirely individual and original.’
Stricker, the author of six poetry collections, said: ‘Receiving the Peter Porter Poetry Prize feels like a counterforce to dark news. What I love is how it affirms the poets that I write alongside as we step into the unknown with our divergent voices, risks, mistakes, wildness, unexpected acts of solidarity and communion. I am immensely grateful to Australian Book Review and its many supporters and readers for the depth of response and respect given to the poems they receive.’
The prize is worth $10,000 in total, with the overall winner receiving $6000, and the four other shortlisted poets each receiving $1000.
The winner of last year’s prize was Australian poet Dan Hogan for their poem ‘Workarounds’.
More information about the Peter Porter Poetry Prize, including the 2025 shortlisted poems, is available on the ABR website.
Category: Awards Local news
