Michael Blackburn

Poetry has always been Michael Blackburn’s main focus as a writer and, since his first pamphlet The Constitution of Things appeared in 1984, he has published nine titles, the most substantial of which is Spyglass over the Lagoon, a collection of over 300 pages. His poems have appeared in a number of anthologies, including the influential Staying Alive from Bloodaxe Books.

Michael Blackburn has been active in many aspects of the literary business: as an editor (Stand magazine, Sunk Island Review, etc); publisher (founder of Jackson’s Arm and Sunk Island Publishing); literature development worker; festival director (Lincoln Literature Festival and the Central Series at Lincoln Central Library); as well as being an experienced creative-writing tutor. As an early devotee of the web he was a writer-in-residence on the internet, for which he produced the hypertext project, The Last of Harry. This was followed by another internet project, Portrait of the Artist as a Cyborg.

He is a regular contributor on current affairs to the online magazine, the Fortnightly Review. He lives in a village outside Lincoln and is a keen walker.