One of these urges had to do with creating a state of peace in the midst of turbulence, a "still point of the turning world," to borrow a phrase from T. S. Eliot.

He wrote in a highly individual, sometimes obscure, way that was in sharp contrast to the compressed intellectual style of T. S. Eliot, W. H. Auden and other contemporary poets.

Burnside has achieved wide critical acclaim, winning the Whitbread Poetry Award in 2000 for the Asylum Dance which was also shortlisted for the Forward and T. s. Eliot prizes.