Moniza Alvi was born in Pakistan and grew up in Hertfordshire. After working for many years as a secondary school teacher, she is now a freelance writer and tutor, and lives in London. Her latest books are Europa (2008) and Split World: Poems 1990-2005 (2008), which includes poems from her five previous collections, The Country at My Shoulder (1993), A Bowl of Warm Air (1996), Carrying My Wife (2000), Souls (2002) and How the Stone Found Its Voice (2005). The Country at My Shoulder was shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot and Whitbread poetry prizes, and Carrying My Wife was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation. Europa was shortlisted for the T.S. Eliot Prize 2008.  Moniza Alvi received a Cholmondeley Award in 2002.