Andrew McMillan, who last week won the Fenton Aldeburgh first collection award, has moved from longlist to shortlist in the Guardian first book award for his collection physical.

Talking about his collection in the Guardian, McMillan said: “Most of the poems come from personal experience, and an ongoing apprenticeship of reading people such as Sharon Olds, Mark Doty, Geoff Hattersley. I’m not the smartest cookie in the supermarket multipack, all I ever hoped my poetry might do was live sincerely in the world and take everything that happened, turn it, distil it, and give it back to the reader – in the hopes it might move them, or be ‘useful’, to borrow a word from Olds. It’s always seemed to me that being direct, being honest, would get us closer to the truth (to the ‘poetic truth’) which is the mark I hope to find.”

The judging panel is made up of historian Tom Holland, broadcaster Emily Maitlis, poet Kei Miller and critic Alex Clark. The winner will be announced on 25 November.