Origins & Early Life

Dame Carol Ann Duffy (born 23 December 1955) is a Scottish poet and playwright. She is a professor of contemporary poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University, and was appointed Poet Laureate in May 2009, serving in this position until her term ended in 2019. She was the first female, the first Scottish-born and the first openly lesbian poet to hold the Poet Laureate position. Her collections include Standing Female Nude (1985), winner of a Scottish Arts Council Book Award; Selling Manhattan (1987), which won a Somerset Maugham Award; Mean Time (1993), which won the Whitbread Poetry Award; and Rapture (2005), which won the T.

Pivotal Works & Achievements

S. Eliot Prize. Her poems address issues such as oppression, gender, and violence, in accessible language. Carol Ann Duffy was born into a Roman Catholic family in the Gorbals area of Glasgow. She was the daughter of Mary (née Black) and Frank Duffy, an electrical fitter.

Enduring Legacy & Impact

Her mother's parents were Irish, and her father had Irish grandparents. The eldest of five siblings, she has four brothers: Frank, Adrian, Eugene and Tim. The family moved to Stafford, England, when Duffy was six years old. Her father worked for English Electric. A trade unionist...

Contemporary Figures & Related Historical Timelines

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• Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi — Historical peer (Died in 2019) (2019): Iraqi militant leader and founder of the Islamic State (IS)
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