Wendy Mary Cope

Poet

A woman standing in a garden underneath a red umbrella Wendy Cope, by Madeleine Waller, 5 July 2006, NPG x131828, © Madeleine Waller / National Portrait Gallery, London

Cope’s first volume of poetry, Making Cocoa for Kingsley Amis was published in 1986 and her third volume If I Don’t Know was shortlisted for the Whitbread Poetry Award in 2001. She was made an OBE in 2010 and her most recent collection was Family Values (2011).

There’s far too much encouragement for poets —
That’s why this country’s going down the drain.

From ‘Engineers’ Corner’ in Making Cocoa for Kingsley Amis (London: Faber & Faber, 1986)

And that orange, it made me so happy,
As ordinary things often do
Just lately. The shopping. A walk in the park.

From ‘The Orange’ in Two Cures for Love: Selected Poems 1979-2006 (London: Faber & Faber, 2008)