Jessica Traynor

Jessica Traynor was born in Dublin in 1984 and is a poet, essayist and librettist. Her debut collection, Liffey Swim (Dedalus Press, 2014), was shortlisted for theStrong/Shine Award and in 2016 was named one of the best poetry debuts of the past five years on Bustle.com. Her second collection, The Quick, was a 2019 Irish Times poetry choice. Her third, Pit Lullabies (2022), was a Poetry Book Society Recommendation and a 2022 Irish Times poetry choice, and was shortlisted for the Yeats Society Sligo’s Poetry Prize 2023. Her awards include the Listowel Poetry Prize, the Lawrence O’Shaughnessy Award for Poetry 2023 and the Field Day Tundish Award 2024. She was an inaugural Creative Fellow of UCD, and is poetry editor at Banshee. Jessica’s latest collection New Arcana was published by Bloodaxe Books in September 2025.