Andrew Motion was UK Poet Laureate from 1999-2009. He was born in London and in 2015 was appointed a Homewood Professor in the Arts at Johns Hopkins University. He is the co-founder and co-Director of The Poetry Archive (poetryarchive.org.uk), and the recipient of several prizes for his work, including most recently the Ted Hughes Award; he was knighted for his services to poetry in 2009. His most recent collection of poems is Peace Talks (2015).