Pia Tafdrup awarded the Prince Henrik Prize 2026
Her Majesty Queen Margrethe of Denmark presenting Pia Tafdrup with the Prince Henrik Prize 2026 Photo: Tobias Scavenius
Danish poet Pia Tafdrup has been awarded the Prince Henrik Prize 2026. She was presented with the award by Her Majesty Queen Margrethe of Denmark in the Garden Hall at Fredensborg Palace on Thursday 11 June 2026.
The Prince Henrik Prize is an honorary award of 300,000 kroner (around £34,799) and a personalised statuette, given to a current and established Danish poet who has made a significant contribution to Danish poetry. The Poetry Prize is awarded annually in connection with Prince Henrik’s birthday on June 11. This year, the Prince would have turned 92.
The 2026 Jury commented:
'Pia Tafdrup is awarded the Prince Henrik Prize 2026 for having enriched Danish literature over five decades with highly qualified, original and varied poetry that maps countless aspects of human existence. With her suggestive, perceptive and precise language and her ability to poetically grapple with the big questions of existence, Pia Tafdrup has given us poems that are both beautiful, personal and universally recognizable.'
Bloodaxe Books has published Pia Tafdrup's work in English translations by David McDuff since 2001. Her most recent book in English translation is the concluding part of her Senses Quintet (2014-2022), The Sight of Light • The Sound of Clouds • The Touch of Skin (2025).
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Pia Tafdrup is one of Denmark’s leading poets. She has published over 20 books in Danish since her first collection appeared in 1981, including widely admired sequences of themed collections. The latest of these is a series of five books focussing on the human senses, her Senses Quintet (2014-2022), which the critic Carsten Palmer Schale has called ‘a cathedral of the soul’ and ‘the best collection of poems written in Scandinavia in the past 20 years’.
Bloodaxe published David McDuff’s translation of the first two collections in the quintet, The Taste of Steel • The Smell of Snow, in one volume in 2021. The second volume, published by Bloodaxe in 2025, brings together his translations of the third, fourth and fifth parts, The Sight of Light • The Sound of Clouds • The Touch of Skin.
Pia Tafdrup's previous poetry collections were also translated into English by David McDuff: Queen's Gate (Bloodaxe, 2001), Tarkovsky's Horses & Other Poems (Bloodaxe, 2010) and Salamander Sun & Other Poems (Bloodaxe, 2015).
In 2001, Pia Tafdrup was appointed a Knight of the Order of Dannebrog; in 2006 she received the Nordic Prize from the Swedish Academy; and in June 2026 she was given the Prince Henrik Prize awarded annually to an established Danish poet who has made a significant contribution to Danish poetry.
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'Reading this collection we become more aware of our human senses and this, in turn, makes us more aware of the world around us and our responses to it. Tafdrup brings home to us the miracle of life and makes us glad to be alive.' – Neil Leabeater, Write Out Loud, on The Sight of Light • The Sound of Clouds • The Touch of Skin
‘Pia Tafrdup is one of the most important contemporary Danish poets, author of over twenty collections of verse, which are often organised into themed series. Her latest is a sequence of five books on human senses, Senses Quintet (2014-2022). […] The five senses in the five books provide the poet with a way of experiencing and portraying life in all its richness, both good and bad.’ – Ana Blasiak, Riveting Reviews, European Literature Network
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US RADIO INTERVIEW WITH PIA TAFDRUP
US Distribution via Consortium Books from 13 January 2026
Trafika Europe Radio, Pia Tafdrup, online 16 January 2026
An excellent in-depth interview with Danish poet Pia Tafdrup was featured on Trafika Europe Radio on 16 January 2026 to coincide with publication in the US. She was in conversation with host Clayton McKee, and was reading and discussing poems her Senses Quintet. The second volume of the Quintet, The Sight of Light • The Sound of Clouds • The Touch of Skin, was published by Bloodaxe in the UK and Ireland in November 2025. Over the course of the interview, Pia read a poem from each of the five collections which make up the Quintet.
All the English translations are by David McDuff, and midway through the interview Pia spoke about her experience of working with David over the course of many years.
Pia read and introduced her poems ‘The darkness machine’ from The Taste of Steel and ‘Your fragrance wakes me’ from The Smell of Snow. The latter Pia read in Danish and then in English. The Taste of Steel • The Smell of Snow was published in one volume by Bloodaxe in 2021.
She went on to read three poems from each of the collections in her latest book The Sight of Light • The Sound of Clouds • The Touch of Skin: ‘The borders between us’, ‘Rain’ and finally ‘Earth poem' from The Touch of Skin.
‘In this episode, host Clayton McKee speaks with Danish poet Pia Tafdrup about her five poetry collections that make up The Senses Quintet. Bloodaxe Books published the Quintet in two collections: The Sight of Light / The Sound of Clouds / The Touch of Skin and The Taste of Steel / The Smell of Snow. Pia Tafdrup explains how she created the quintet and dives into her views on poetics, language, and nature. This interview includes a reading of one poem from each of the five quintets, including one poem read in both original and English translation. The English translation of The Quintet was done by David McDuff. You can read a sampling of Pia Tafdrup's poems in Trafika Europe's All-Poetry Issue.’
https://omny.fm/shows/trafika-europe-radio/danish-poet-pia-tafdrup-on-the-five-senses-quintet
US ONLINE POEM FEATURE
Trafika Europe, Poem feature, online 17 October 2025
Five poems from Danish poet Pia Tafdrup’s new book The Sight of Light • The Sound of Clouds • The Touch of Skin in David McDuff’s English translation were featured in Fall issue of Trafika Europe, the US-based online quarterly digest featuring new writing in translation from across Europe. The featured poems were ‘Bonfire’, ‘The Katsura tree’, ‘Forest fires’, ‘Arctic wilderness’ and ‘Favourite word’.
https://www.trafikaeurope.org/all-poetry/?c=04007ae3e449
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ONLINE LAUNCH EVENT
Bloodaxe hosted an online launch event for new titles by Tomas Venclova, Pia Tafdrup and Ivan V. Lalić (1931-96) on 20 November 2025. Reading from and discussing the books with the host, Bloodaxe editor Neil Astley, were Tomas Venclova in Vilnius with translator Ellen Hinsey in Berlin, Pia Tafdrup in Copenhagen, and Ivan V. Lalić's translator Francis R. Jones (in Northumberland) with Professor Svetlana Šeatović (in Belgrade).
This free Bloodaxe launch event was streamed on YouTube Live and is now available to watch below, and on this YouTube page: https://youtube.com/live/OTRTqP2CCSc
[18 June 2026]
