Clanchy lived in the
East End of London for several years, before moving to
Oxford where she was a fellow of
Oxford Brookes University and served as City Poet. She is Writer in Residence for Sanctuary Arts, at
Mansfield College, Oxford. In 2021 she wrote an essay about the deaths of her parents from
COVID-19.
Teaching Clanchy qualified as a teacher in 1989 and has taught since in several different institutions. From 2009 to 2019, she combined employment as a teacher and a role as Writer in Residence at
Oxford Spires Academy, a multicultural comprehensive school. Students included
Mukahang Limbu, Shukria Rezaei, and Amineh Abou Kerech. In 2018, she edited an anthology of poems written by her students,
England: Poems from a School, which was widely reviewed. Over the lockdown period of 2020, Clanchy met on Zoom with her students and published their poems on Twitter where they became popular. In 2021, she published a self-help guide to writing poetry,
How to Grow Your Own Poem.
Writing Clanchy won an
Eric Gregory Award in 1995. She published three poetry collections between 1996 and 2004. They won a
Forward Prize, the
Scottish First Book of the Year (then Saltire Prize) two
Scottish Arts Council Book Awards, and a
Somerset Maugham Award. In 2008, she moved into non fiction with a memoir about her relationship with her Kosovan neighbour.
What is She Doing Here? This was republished as
Antigona and Me and won the Writers Guild Award. In 2009, she won both the VS Pritchett and
BBC National Short Story Award. This was followed by a novel,
Meeting the English, which was shortlisted for the
Costa Prize, and a collection of short stories,
The Not Dead and the Saved. Clanchy has written and adapted for BBC Radio since 2001 with 12 plays and serials produced, including
Hester,
A Little Princess, which starred
Adjoa Andoh and
Enduring Love. In 2015, her broadcast anthology of her pupils' work,
We Are Writing a Poem About Home, was shortlisted for the
Ted Hughes Award. In 2018, she was awarded a
Cholmondeley Award.
Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me Clanchy's 2019 memoir of her teaching experience,
Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me won the
Orwell Prize for Political Writing in 2020, but also incurred criticism for "racist and ableist stereotyping" in some of its descriptions of schoolchildren. In 2021, Clanchy posted on Twitter encouraging followers to report a
Goodreads review of
Some Kids I Taught and What They Taught Me, wrongly stating that they had "made up a racist quote and said it was in my book," and then saying that the quotes had been "taken out of context". Clanchy later apologised for "overreacting" to criticism and promised to rewrite the book, writing on Twitter: “I know I got many things wrong, and welcome the chance to write better, more lovingly." Clanchy was criticised by other authors, including
Chimene Suleyman,
Monisha Rajesh and
Sunny Singh, who received large amounts of abuse as a result of the online debate. Clanchy's publishers,
Picador, an imprint of
Macmillan Publishing, issued three statements of apology in August 2021 and stated that the book would be rewritten. Further statements of apology were made following an interview with Philip Gwyn Jones, publisher of Picador, in the
Daily Telegraph in December 2021. Clanchy was defended in articles by
Sonia Sodha, who stated that "the strand of anti-racist thinking that is obsessed with the blame and shame all white people should bear for structural discrimination is (so) corrosive to common cause and understanding", and by Clive Davis,
Tomiwa Owolade, Shukria Rezaei,
Carmen Callil,
Amanda Craig, and
Philip Pullman. A group of her former students wrote that they were "disempowered and distressed" by the critics' allegations. In December 2021, Clanchy published an article in
Prospect magazine on the personal impact of public
cancellation. Her publisher Picador announced they had parted company by mutual consent. In an interview for
UnHerd, Clanchy said that the apology put out by Pan Macmillan had been made "over her head" and without consulting her. She subsequently wrote an article on
sensitivity readers, which provoked discussion, especially in the context of the
Roald Dahl revision controversy. Clanchy is now published by Swift Press. In November 2025 Pan Macmillan CEO Joanna Prior apologised to Clanchy and others involved in the controversy, calling it "a regrettable series of events in Pan Macmillan's past." In November 2025
BBC Radio 4 launched a six part podcast series on the events entitled
Anatomy of a Cancellation.
Works Other work includes: • • 1st edition Chatto & Windus, 1995 • (editor) • • 1st edition Picador, 2004 • • • • • • •
Honours and awards Clanchy was appointed a
Fellow of the
Royal Society of Literature (FRSL) in 2010, and resigned her fellowship in 2023. She was appointed a
Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) in the
2018 Birthday Honours. Other awards include: • 1994
Eric Gregory Award • 1996
London Arts Board New Writer Award* • 1996 Saltire Society
Scottish First Book of the Year Award for
Slattern • 1996 Scottish Arts Council Book Award for
Slattern • 1997 Mail on Sunday/
John Llewellyn Rhys Prize (shortlist) for
Slattern • 2004 Forward Poetry Prize (Best Poetry Collection of the Year) (shortlist) for
Newborn • 2009 Writers' Guild Award for Best Book (
What is She Doing Here) • 2009
BBC National Short Story Award for
The Not-Dead and The Saved • 2015 Ted Hughes Award for Poetry (shortlist) • 2018
Cholmondeley Award. ==References==