About

The North End of the Possible, Amy Jo Philip’s second full collection of poems, was published by Salt in 2013. The Ambulance Box, her first book, was published in spring 2009 by Salt; shortlisted for the Seamus Heaney Centre Prize for Poetry 2010, the Scottish Mortgage Investment Trust First Book Award 2010 and the Aldeburgh First Collection Prize 2009; and highly commended in the 2009 Forward anothology. It followed two successful poetry pamphlets with HappenStance Press: Tonguefire (2005) and Andrew Philip: A Sampler (2008). Her work has also appeared in a variety of magazines and anthologies, most recently Coming & Going: Poems for Journeys (HappenStance, 2019).

A seasoned performer of her own work, Amy Jo has given readings and led workshops throughout the UK, from Orkney to London, including an online course for the Poetry School in 2010. She has also written  “Sound and Rhythm”, a worksheet for the Scottish Poetry Library‘s ideas box, and her introduction to writing poetry is one of the most popular pages at the Crafty Writer.

Amy Jo was born as Andrew in 1975 in Aberdeen, north-east Scotland and grew up in a former mining village near Falkirk in the Scottish central belt. After leaving school, she lived in Berlin for a short spell, returning to Scotland studying linguistics at the University of Edinburgh. She now lives in Bo’ness, near Edinburgh. After working for the Scottish Parliament’s official report for 18 years, she was ordained in Scottish Episcopal Church and served hern curacy at St Mary’s Cathedral in Edinburgh. She came out as transgender in 2021 and separated from her wife. Having returned to her old day job in the official report, she currently serves as a non-stipendiary (i.e., unpaid) priest in her local Episcopal church.