Granta lands new poetry from Lerner, Ramayya, Patrick and Olayiwola

Granta has announced four acquisitions for its poetry list, with a new collection of poetry by Ben Lerner, the second collection of poetry by Nisha Ramayya, and two debut collections, by K Patrick and Oluwaseun Olayiwola.

Poetry editor Rachael Allen jointly acquired UK and Commonwealth rights to Ben Lerner’s The Lights with Laura Barber from Lucy Luck at C&W on behalf of Anna Stein at CAA. The collection – which Granta said “experiments in the collectivisation of feeling” – will publish September 2023.

World rights to Patrick’s Three Births were acquired by Allen from Angelique Tran Van Sang at Felicity Bryan. The publisher praised it as a “kaleidoscopic, pleasure-garden of a space” which interrogates an experience of queer love. Meanwhile, world rights to Ramayya’s Now Let’s Take a Listening Walk – which uses Alice Coltrane’s music to explore the relationship between race and sound – were acquired directly from the author. Patrick and Ramayya’s collections will both publish in 2024.

Allen acquired UK and Commonwealth rights to Olayiwola’s Strange Beach from Kirsty McLachlan at Morgan Green Creatives after a three-way auction. Granta lauded the collection as a “highly patterned and textual lyrical play”.

Allen said of the acquisitions: “The next year is going to be extremely strong for Granta Poetry, as we continue to publish the most innovative and boundary pushing work. I cannot wait to publish these four defining – and defying – collections.”