His father Peter was a former electrician, probation officer and firefighter who was well known locally for writing plays and pantomimes for his all-male panto group, The Avalanche Dodgers.

He produced a dramatised version of Homer's Odyssey and a collection of poetry entitled Tyrannosaurus Rex Versus The Corduroy Kid (shortlisted for the T. S. Eliot Prize), both published in 2006.

"[9] His translation of Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (2007) was adopted for the ninth edition of The Norton Anthology of English Literature, and he was the narrator of a 2010 BBC documentary about the poem and its use of landscape.

The poems, complemented with commissioned wood engravings by Hilary Paynter, were also published in several limited editions under the title 'In Memory of Water' by Fine Press Poetry.

[26] On 21 September 2019 he read his poem "Fugitives", commissioned by the Association of Areas of Natural Beauty, on Arnside Knott, Cumbria, in celebration of the 70th anniversary of the National Parks and Access to the Countryside Act, during an event which included the formation of a heart outlined by people on the hillside.

[27][28][29][30] Armitage wrote "Ark" for the naming ceremony of the British Antarctic Survey's new ship RRS Sir David Attenborough on 26 September 2019.

[31][32][33][34] "the event horizon" was written in 2019 to commemorate the opening of The Oglesby Centre, an extension to Hallé St Peter's, the Halle orchestra's venue for rehearsals, recordings, education and small performances.

"[36] On 12 January 2020, Armitage gave the first reading of his poem "Astronomy for Beginners", written to celebrate the bicentenary of the Royal Astronomical Society, on BBC Radio 4's Broadcasting House.

[43][44] Huddersfield Choral Society commissioned Armitage to provide lyrics for works by Cheryl Frances-Hoad and Daniel Kidane, resulting in "The Song Thrush and the Mountain Ash" and "We'll Sing", which were released on video in autumn 2020.

It refers to the snow on the day of his death, and Armitage has said "I've written about a dozen laureate poems since I was appointed, but this is the first royal occasion and it feels like a big one".

[59][60] "Futurama" was Armitage's response to the 2021 Cop26 conference held in Glasgow, and he said of it "I was trying to chart the peculiar dream-like state we seem to be in, where the rules and natural laws of the old world feel to be in flux".

[61][62] In November 2019 Armitage announced that he would donate his salary as poet laureate to create the Poetry School's Laurel Prize for a collection of poems "with nature and the environment at their heart".

[78][79] On World Poetry Day, 21 March 2023, he released his "Plum Tree Among the Skyscrapers", the first of a series of 10 works to be commissioned by the National Trust and created by Armitage and his band LYR.

[82][83][84] In July 2023, Armitage spent time on Spitsbergen at the British Antarctic Survey's Ny-Ålesund research station, and wrote a group of poems relating to his visit.

[86][87] In November 2019 Armitage announced that each spring for ten years he would spend a week touring five to seven libraries giving a one-hour poetry reading and perhaps introducing a guest poet.

[95] Between 24 March and 1 April Armitage read at Chadderton with Keisha Thompson, Fateha Alam and Lawdy Karim; at Carmarthen with Ifor ap Glyn; at Clevedon with Phoebe Stuckes; at Colyton with Elizabeth-Jane Burnett; at Chatham with Patience Agbabi; at Cambridge University Library with Imtiaz Dharker; at Clydebank with Kathleen Jamie and Tawona Sitholé; and at Taigh Chearsabhagh on North Uist with Kevin MacNeil.

The launch event was held at Harlesden library, where Somali poet Asha Lul Mohamud Yusuf and her translator Clare Pollard read from her award-winning The Sea Migrations: Tahriib.

Kent libraries hosted an event where Armitage joined the reading group in HM Prison East Sutton Park.

At Haverfordwest library, Armitage read alongside poet, novelist and playwright Owen Sheers and Pushcart Prize nominee Bethany Handley.

[98] At The Hive, Worcester, a joint public and academic library and archive centre, Armitage read with Amelie Simon, Worcestershire's Young Poet Laureate.

[103] Most recently Armitage wrote the libretto for an opera scored by Scottish composer Stuart MacRae, The Assassin Tree, based on a Greek myth recounted in The Golden Bough.

Saturday Night (Century Films, BBC2, 1996) – wrote and narrated a fifty-minute poetic commentary to a documentary about nightlife in Leeds, directed by Brian Hill.

Along the route he stopped to give poetry readings, often in exchange for donations of money, food or accommodation, despite the rejection of the free life seen in his 1993 poem "Hitcher", and has written a book about his journey, called Walking Home.

[4] During what his wife Sue described as "a bit of a mid-life crisis", Armitage and his college friend Craig Smith founded the band The Scaremongers.

They released their debut album Call in the Crash Team in 2020 and a single, "Winter Solstice", in 2021 featuring Wendy Smith from Prefab Sprout.

His choice of music included David Bowie's "Moonage Daydream"; his chosen book was the Oxford English Dictionary, and his luxury was a tennis ball.