Rachael Allen was born in Cornwall to a working-class family. Her interest in poetry began on her 15th birthday, when she bought an anthology called Modern Women Poets. At Goldsmiths College, where she studied English literature, she formed a poetry collective that put on readings and started a small press, which evolved into the anthology series clinic. She holds a PhD from Hull University.
Allen’s first full-length collection of poems, Kingdomland (Faber, 2019), was a Poetry Book Society Choice. Her second collection was God Complex (2024), which was shortlisted for the Forward Prize and longlisted for the Laurel Prize. She was selected for pamphlet publication as one of Faber’s New Poets in 2014, and she also published the pamphlet Hypochondria (If a Leaf Falls Press, 2017). She has co-authored artists’ books with Marie Jacotey, JocJonJosch, Guy Gormley, Jet Swan, and Ben Sanderson. Her writing has appeared in Lit Hub, the Poetry Foundation, Poetry London, The Sunday Times, The White Review online, Five Dials, and other outlets, as well as several anthologies.
Allen is the recipient of a Northern Writers’ Award, an Eric Gregory Award, and a New Writing North Andrew Waterhouse Award. She became the Mahler and LeWitt Studios’ first poet-in-residence in 2018. She co-hosted the Faber Poetry podcast with Jack Underwood. She co-founded of the online journal tender and was co-editor of the small press Monitor Books.
Allen was the poetry editor for Granta magazine for over a decade and started the poetry list at Granta Books. She launched Fitzcarraldo Editions’ poetry list in 2025 and is now their poetry editor. She currently lectures in creative writing at Queen Mary University of London and lives in London.
-
More Rachael Allen
Text: Read six poems by Allen that respond to Vera Iliatova paintings, at Poetry London
Text: Read an interview with Allen at Forward Arts Foundation