Dawn Watson is a poet and writer. She lives in Belfast with her son and is a Lecturer in Creative Writing at Queen’s University.
Dawn’s debut collection We Play Here (2023) is published with Granta Books. It was a Guardian Poetry Book of the Year and was shortlisted for the John Pollard International Poetry Prize for an outstanding debut collection, and the PEN Heaney Prize. Her poetry pamphlet The Stack of Owls is Getting Higher (2019) is published with The Emma Press. Dawn’s work has been broadcast on BBC Radio 4, BBC Radio 3, and BBC Radio Ulster, and has appeared in leading literary journals including The Poetry Review and Granta.
Dawn has been the recipient of an ACES award and a General Award from the Arts Council NI, and is a former national tabloid sub editor. She completed a PhD in poetry in 2022 titled ‘Strangely Alive’: Elizabeth Bishop and the ‘Art of Story Writing’ and has an MA in Poetry: Creativity and Criticism from Queen’s University. As an English undergraduate, she won the Ruth West Poetry Scholarship Award, the Dr Henry Hutchinson Stewart Literary Scholarship for academic achievement, and the Dr George Alexander Baird Scholarship.
Dawn Watson 