Pat Borthwick

Pat Borthwick spent much of her upbringing on the canals and waterways of Britain. She now lives in Yorkshire.  She works as a freelance writer, a creative writing tutor and a Poet in Schools.
Pat has three full length collections (Between Clouds and Caves, Swim,  and Admiral FitzRoy's Barometer) and several pamphlets.  Her poems have won prizes in numerous competitions and have been widely published in magazines and anthologies.  Roger Garfitt has described Pat as ‘a conjuror with real stars up her sleeve’ and Simon Armitage has referred to her poems as ‘maps you can truly find your way by’.  Her poetry often addresses rural issues and how landscape and man continue to shape each other. Her other main themes include astronomy and grey areas.

She is a founder member and former Chair of NAWE (the Northern Association of Writers in Education) and in 1984 originated and designed the Yorkshire Open Poetry Competition, continuing with its development today as a lead organiser. She has been the Blue Nose Poet of the Year and was awarded a Hawthornden Fellowship in 2003.