Jo Shapcott has won the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry. Her collection, Of Mutability, which traces her experience of breast cancer, has already won the Costa book of the year award.

Shapcott previously turned down a CBE in 2003 because of Britain’s involvement in the Iraq war. Previous winners of the Queen’s Gold Medal, which was established in 1933, include WH Auden, Siegfried Sassoon, and John Betjeman. Shapcott has also won the National Poetry Competition twice, the Commonwealth poetry prize, and the Forward prize.