Poetry collection inspired by cancer wins top literary prize

Jo Shapcott's surprise victory with her book, Of Mutability, makes it two years in a row that poetry has won the Costa Book Award.

The winner was announced last night at a ceremony in Quaglino's restaurant in Mayfair, central London.

The chairman of the judging panel, broadcaster Andrew Neil said: "The judges thought that it was accessible, compassionate, one of them said it was a celebration of life whatever was thrown at you and they had been captivated by the poetry and for these reasons, though there were other strong challengers, they thought Of Mutability deserved to win.

"They wanted to stress the accessibility. They appreciate that poetry is not everybody's first choice in literature and this is the second year Costa has chosen poetry to be its book of the year but they really felt that if someone was uncertain of poetry, if they got this book in their hands they would quickly fall in love with it and read it again and again as many of the judges did before coming to their decision."

Many critics – and the bookmakers – had tipped Edmund de Waal's family memoir The Hare With Amber Eyes to win, but Mr Neil said its status as favourite had not worked against it.

Shapcott, a professor of creative writing at Royal Holloway College, University of London, and President of the Poetry Society, has won several poetry prizes since publishing her first book in 1988.

She accepted the book had been described as being a response to breast cancer but added: "I would say more that it is a series of meditations on mortality, some of which are terribly cheerful."

The acknowledgements in the front of the slim 54-page volume say it "owes everything" to the medical team at Hereford County Hospital who treated her.

Judges included actors David Morrissey and Elizabeth McGovern and authors Ruth Padel, Adele Parks and Tim Bowler.

Other shortlisted books were Jason Wallace's children's book Out Of Shadows and Kishwar Desai's novel Witness The Night.

The five shortlisted authors received 5,000 each, Shapcott winning another 30,000.