Pascale Petit was born in Paris, grew up in France and Wales and lives in London. Her latest collection What the Water Gave Me: Poems after Frida Kahlo (Seren, 2010) was shortlisted for the TS Eliot Prize and was a Book of the year in the Observer. Black Lawrence Press published a US edition in 2011. She has published five poetry books, three of which were shortlisted for the TS Eliot Prize and which were also Books of the Year in the Times Literary Supplement, Observer and the Independent. Her second collection The Zoo Father was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation and was published in Mexico in a bilingual edition. A poem from it was shortlisted for a Forward Prize. In 2004 the Poetry Book Society selected Petit as one of the Next Generation Poets. Petit has won numerous awards, including three from Arts Council England. She trained as a sculptor at the Royal College of Art and was a visual artist for the first part of her life. She is widely travelled, including in the Venezuelan Amazon, China and Nepal. She co-edited Tying the Song (Enitharmon, 2000), the first anthology from The Poetry School, has worked as Poetry Editor for Poetry London and was a Royal Literary Fund Fellow at Middlesex University 2007 - 2009. She currently tutors poetry courses for Tate Modern, the Arvon Foundation and Ty Newydd.