All Hail Carol Ann Duffy

The honor of Britian’s top poet has been bestowed upon everyone from Dryden to Tennyson to Wordsworth. But for the first time in 341 years, the Poet Laureate is a woman. Carol Ann Duffy, 53, who is known for chronicling the details of daily life, will be responsible for bringing poetry into schools and feeding the Poetry Archive, where poets read their work out loud. While the position was formally appointed by Queen Elizabeth, Prime Minister Gordon Brown called Duffy a “truly brilliant modern poet who has stretched our imaginations by putting the whole range of human experiences into lines that capture the emotions perfectly.”