''Oxford Poetry'' is a
literary magazine
A literary magazine is a periodical devoted to literature in a broad sense. Literary magazines usually publish short stories, poetry, and essays, along with literary criticism, book reviews, biographical profiles of authors, interviews and letter ...
based in
Oxford
Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...
, England.
It is currently edited by Luke Allan. The magazine is published by
Partus Press
Partus may refer to:
* childbirth
Childbirth, also known as labour and delivery, is the ending of pregnancy where one or more babies exits the internal environment of the mother via vaginal delivery or caesarean section. In 2019, there we ...
.
Founded in 1910 by
Basil Blackwell
Sir Basil Henry Blackwell (29 May 18899 April 1984) was born in Oxford, England. He was the son of Benjamin Henry Blackwell (18491924), founder of Blackwell's bookshop in Oxford, which went on to become the Blackwell family's publishing and booksh ...
, its editors have included
Dorothy L. Sayers
Dorothy Leigh Sayers (; 13 June 1893 – 17 December 1957) was an English crime writer and poet. She was also a student of classical and modern languages.
She is best known for her mysteries, a series of novels and short stories set between th ...
,
Aldous Huxley
Aldous Leonard Huxley (26 July 1894 – 22 November 1963) was an English writer and philosopher. He wrote nearly 50 books, both novels and non-fiction works, as well as wide-ranging essays, narratives, and poems.
Born into the prominent Huxley ...
,
Robert Graves
Captain Robert von Ranke Graves (24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985) was a British poet, historical novelist and critic. His father was Alfred Perceval Graves, a celebrated Irish poet and figure in the Gaelic revival; they were both Celtic ...
,
Vera Brittain
Vera Mary Brittain (29 December 1893 – 29 March 1970) was an English Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD) nurse, writer, feminist, socialist and pacifist. Her best-selling 1933 memoir ''Testament of Youth'' recounted her experiences during the First ...
,
Kingsley Amis
Sir Kingsley William Amis (16 April 1922 – 22 October 1995) was an English novelist, poet, critic, and teacher. He wrote more than 20 novels, six volumes of poetry, a memoir, short stories, radio and television scripts, and works of social an ...
,
Anthony Thwaite
Anthony Simon Thwaite (23 June 1930 – 22 April 2021) was an English poet and critic, widely known as the editor of his friend Philip Larkin's collected poems and letters.
Early years and education
Born in Chester, England, to Yorkshire par ...
,
John Fuller and
Bernard O'Donoghue
Bernard O'Donoghue FRSL (born 1945) is a contemporary Irish poet and academic.
Early life and education
Bernard O'Donoghue was born on 14 December 1945 in Cullen, County Cork, Ireland, where he lived on a farm. “My father was a terrible and r ...
.
Among the other authors to have appeared in ''Oxford Poetry'' are
Fleur Adcock
Fleur Adcock (born 10 February 1934) is a New Zealand poet and editor, of English and Northern Irish ancestry, who has lived much of her life in England. She is well-represented in New Zealand poetry anthologies, was awarded an honorary doc ...
,
A. Alvarez
Alfred Alvarez (5 August 1929 – 23 September 2019) was an English poet, novelist, essayist and critic who published under the name A. Alvarez and Al Alvarez.
Background
Alfred Alvarez was born in London, to an Ashkenazic Jewish mother and a ...
,
W. H. Auden
Wystan Hugh Auden (; 21 February 1907 – 29 September 1973) was a British-American poet. Auden's poetry was noted for its stylistic and technical achievement, its engagement with politics, morals, love, and religion, and its variety in ...
,
Anne Carson
Anne Carson (born June 21, 1950) is a Canadian poet, essayist, translator, classicist, and professor.
Trained at the University of Toronto, Carson has taught classics, comparative literature, and creative writing at universities across the Unit ...
,
Nevill Coghill
Nevill Henry Kendal Aylmer Coghill (19 April 1899 – 6 November 1980) was an English literary scholar, known especially for his modern English version of Geoffrey Chaucer's ''Canterbury Tales''.
Life
His father was Sir Egerton Coghill, 5th ...
,
David Constantine
David John Constantine (born 1944) is an English poet, author and translator.
Background
Born in Salford, Constantine read Modern Languages at Wadham College, Oxford, and was a Fellow of The Queen's College, Oxford, until 2000, when he became a ...
,
Robert Crawford,
Carol Ann Duffy
Dame Carol Ann Duffy (born 23 December 1955) is a Scottish poet and playwright. She is a professor of contemporary poetry at Manchester Metropolitan University, and was appointed Poet Laureate in May 2009, resigning in 2019. She was the first ...
,
Elaine Feinstein
Elaine Feinstein FRSL (born Elaine Cooklin; 24 October 1930 – 23 September 2019) was an English poet, novelist, short-story writer, playwright, biographer and translator. She joined the Council of the Royal Society of Literature in 2007.
Earl ...
,
Graham Greene
Henry Graham Greene (2 October 1904 – 3 April 1991) was an English writer and journalist regarded by many as one of the leading English novelists of the 20th century. Combining literary acclaim with widespread popularity, Greene acquir ...
,
Seamus Heaney
Seamus Justin Heaney (; 13 April 1939 – 30 August 2013) was an Irish poet, playwright and translator. He received the 1995 Nobel Prize in Literature. ,
W. N. Herbert
W. N. Herbert , also known as Bill Herbert (born 1961) is a poet from Dundee, Scotland. He writes in both English and Scots. He and Richard Price founded the poetry magazine '' Gairfish''. He currently teaches at Newcastle University.
Early ...
,
Geoffrey Hill
Sir Geoffrey William Hill, FRSL (18 June 1932 – 30 June 2016) was an English poet, professor emeritus of English literature and religion, and former co-director of the Editorial Institute, at Boston University. Hill has been considered to be ...
,
Christopher Isherwood
Christopher William Bradshaw Isherwood (26 August 1904 – 4 January 1986) was an Anglo-American novelist, playwright, screenwriter, autobiographer, and diarist. His best-known works include '' Goodbye to Berlin'' (1939), a semi-autobiographical ...
,
Elizabeth Jennings,
Jenny Joseph,
Stephen Knight,
Ronald Knox
Ronald Arbuthnott Knox (17 February 1888 – 24 August 1957) was an Catholic Church in England and Wales, English Catholic priest, Catholic theology, theologian, author, and radio broadcaster. Educated at Eton College, Eton and Balliol Colleg ...
,
Philip Larkin
Philip Arthur Larkin (9 August 1922 – 2 December 1985) was an English poet, novelist, and librarian. His first book of poetry, '' The North Ship'', was published in 1945, followed by two novels, '' Jill'' (1946) and '' A Girl in Winter'' (1 ...
,
C. Day-Lewis,
Michael Longley
Michael Longley, (born 27 July 1939, Belfast, Northern Ireland), is an Anglo-Irish poet.
Life and career
One of twin boys, Michael Longley was born in Belfast, Northern Ireland, to English parents, Longley was educated at the Royal Belfast A ...
,
Louis MacNeice
Frederick Louis MacNeice (12 September 1907 – 3 September 1963) was an Irish poet and playwright, and a member of the Auden Group, which also included W. H. Auden, Stephen Spender and Cecil Day-Lewis. MacNeice's body of work was widely a ...
,
Peter McDonald,
Christopher Middleton,
Andrew Motion
Sir Andrew Motion (born 26 October 1952) is an English poet, novelist, and biographer, who was Poet Laureate from 1999 to 2009. During the period of his laureateship, Motion founded the Poetry Archive, an online resource of poems and audio reco ...
,
Paul Muldoon
Paul Muldoon (born 20 June 1951) is an Irish poet. He has published more than thirty collections and won a Pulitzer Prize for Poetry and the T. S. Eliot Prize. At Princeton University he is currently both the Howard G. B. Clark '21 University Pr ...
,
Tom Paulin
Thomas Neilson Paulin (born 25 January 1949 in Leeds, England) is a Northern Irish poet and critic of film, music and literature. He lives in England, where he was the G. M. Young Lecturer in English Literature at Hertford College, Oxford.
Earl ...
,
Mario Petrucci
Mario Petrucci (born 1958) is a poet, literary translator, educator and broadcaster. He was born in Lambeth, London and trained as a physicist at Selwyn College in the University of Cambridge and later completed a PhD in vacuum crystal growth at ...
,
Craig Raine
Craig Anthony Raine, FRSL (born 3 December 1944) is an English contemporary poet. Along with Christopher Reid, he is a notable pioneer of Martian poetry, a movement that expresses alienation with the world, society and objects. He was a fellow of ...
,
Jo Shapcott
Jo Shapcott FRSL (born 24 March 1953, London) is an English poet, editor and lecturer who has won the National Poetry Competition, the Commonwealth Poetry Prize, the Costa Book of the Year Award, a Forward Poetry Prize and the Cholmondeley Awa ...
,
Stephen Spender
Sir Stephen Harold Spender (28 February 1909 – 16 July 1995) was an English poet, novelist and essayist whose work concentrated on themes of social injustice and the class struggle. He was appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry by the ...
,
George Szirtes
George Szirtes (; born 29 November 1948) is a British poet and translator from the Hungarian language into English. Originally from Hungary, he has lived in the United Kingdom for most of his life after coming to the country as a refugee at the ...
,
J. R. R. Tolkien
John Ronald Reuel Tolkien (, ; 3 January 1892 – 2 September 1973) was an English writer and philology, philologist. He was the author of the high fantasy works ''The Hobbit'' and ''The Lord of the Rings''.
From 1925 to 1945, Tolkien was ...
,
Susan Wicks
Susan Wicks (born 1947 Kent, England) is a British poet and novelist.
She studied at the University of Hull, University of Sussex. She taught at University College, Dublin, University of Dijon, and the University of Kent.
She teaches at Goldsm ...
and
Charles Wright. Traditionally the magazine publishes winners of Oxford's
Newdigate Prize.
Editors of ''Oxford Poetry''
Until the Second World War
* 1910–13: Gerald H. Crow, Geoffery Dennis,
Sherard Vines
Walter Sherard Vines (1890–1974), known as Sherard Vines, was an English author and academic. He began publishing poetry in the 1910s, then in the 1920s spent five years teaching at Keio University in Tokyo, Japan. While in Japan and after his ...
* 1914: Gerald H. Crow,
Sherard Vines
Walter Sherard Vines (1890–1974), known as Sherard Vines, was an English author and academic. He began publishing poetry in the 1910s, then in the 1920s spent five years teaching at Keio University in Tokyo, Japan. While in Japan and after his ...
* 1915: Gerald H. Crow, T. W. Earp
* 1916:
Wilfred Rowland Childe
Wilfred Rowland Childe (1890–1952) was a British author and poet.
Childe was educated at Harrow School and Magdalen College, Oxford. He edited ''Oxford Poetry'' in 1916 and 1917.
In 1922, Childe became an Assistant Lecturer in English literat ...
, T. W. Earp,
Aldous Huxley
Aldous Leonard Huxley (26 July 1894 – 22 November 1963) was an English writer and philosopher. He wrote nearly 50 books, both novels and non-fiction works, as well as wide-ranging essays, narratives, and poems.
Born into the prominent Huxley ...
* 1917: Wilfred Rowland Childe, T. W. Earp,
Dorothy L. Sayers
Dorothy Leigh Sayers (; 13 June 1893 – 17 December 1957) was an English crime writer and poet. She was also a student of classical and modern languages.
She is best known for her mysteries, a series of novels and short stories set between th ...
* 1918: T. W. Earp,
E. F. A. Geach, Dorothy L. Sayers
* 1919: T. W. Earp, Dorothy L. Sayers,
Siegfried Sassoon
Siegfried Loraine Sassoon (8 September 1886 – 1 September 1967) was an English war poet, writer, and soldier. Decorated for bravery on the Western Front, he became one of the leading poets of the First World War. His poetry both describ ...
* 1920:
Vera Brittain
Vera Mary Brittain (29 December 1893 – 29 March 1970) was an English Voluntary Aid Detachment (VAD) nurse, writer, feminist, socialist and pacifist. Her best-selling 1933 memoir ''Testament of Youth'' recounted her experiences during the First ...
,
C. H. B. Kitchin, Alan Porter
* 1921: Alan Porter,
Richard Hughes,
Robert Graves
Captain Robert von Ranke Graves (24 July 1895 – 7 December 1985) was a British poet, historical novelist and critic. His father was Alfred Perceval Graves, a celebrated Irish poet and figure in the Gaelic revival; they were both Celtic ...
* 1922: No editors cited.
* 1923:
David Cleghorn Thomson
David Cleghorn Thomson (9 October 1900 – 23 April 1980), was a Scottish journalist, author, poet, playwright, and Liberal and Labour Party politician. He was notably Director of the BBC's Scottish Region.
Background
Thomson was born in Edinb ...
,
F. W. Bateson
* 1924:
Harold Acton
Sir Harold Mario Mitchell Acton (5 July 1904 – 27 February 1994) was a British writer, scholar, and aesthete who was a prominent member of the Bright Young Things. He wrote fiction, biography, history and autobiography. During his stay in Ch ...
,
Peter Quennell
Sir Peter Courtney Quennell (9 March 1905 – 27 October 1993) was an English biographer, literary historian, editor, essayist, poet, and critic. He wrote extensively on social history.
Life
Born in Bickley, Kent, the son of architect C. H ...
* 1925: Patrick Monkhouse, Charles Plumb
* 1926: Charles Plumb,
W. H. Auden
Wystan Hugh Auden (; 21 February 1907 – 29 September 1973) was a British-American poet. Auden's poetry was noted for its stylistic and technical achievement, its engagement with politics, morals, love, and religion, and its variety in ...
* 1927:
W. H. Auden
Wystan Hugh Auden (; 21 February 1907 – 29 September 1973) was a British-American poet. Auden's poetry was noted for its stylistic and technical achievement, its engagement with politics, morals, love, and religion, and its variety in ...
,
C. Day-Lewis
* 1928:
Clere Parsons Clere Parsons (1908 - 1931) was an English poet, born in India.
He was educated at Christ Church, University of Oxford, and edited the 1928 edition of ''Oxford Poetry''.
His only collection, ''Poems'', was published after his death by Faber & Fabe ...
,
Basil Blackwell
Sir Basil Henry Blackwell (29 May 18899 April 1984) was born in Oxford, England. He was the son of Benjamin Henry Blackwell (18491924), founder of Blackwell's bookshop in Oxford, which went on to become the Blackwell family's publishing and booksh ...
* 1929:
Louis MacNeice
Frederick Louis MacNeice (12 September 1907 – 3 September 1963) was an Irish poet and playwright, and a member of the Auden Group, which also included W. H. Auden, Stephen Spender and Cecil Day-Lewis. MacNeice's body of work was widely a ...
,
Stephen Spender
Sir Stephen Harold Spender (28 February 1909 – 16 July 1995) was an English poet, novelist and essayist whose work concentrated on themes of social injustice and the class struggle. He was appointed Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry by the ...
* 1930: Stephen Spender,
Bernard Spencer
Charles Bernard Spencer (1909 – 1963) was an English poet, translator, and editor.
He was born in Madras, India and educated at Marlborough College and Corpus Christi College, Oxford. At Marlborough he knew John Betjeman and Louis MacNeic ...
* 1931: Bernard Spencer, Richard Goodman
* 1932: Richard Goodman
* 1933–5: No editions.
* 1936: A. W. Sandford,
Alan Rook (William) Alan Rook OBE (1909 – 1990) was a British Cairo poet and edited the 1936 issue of ''New Oxford Poetry''.
As a soldier
In the Second World War Rook served as a Lieutenant anti-aircraft gunner with the 6th A.A. Division of the Royal Art ...
* 1937:
Nevill Coghill
Nevill Henry Kendal Aylmer Coghill (19 April 1899 – 6 November 1980) was an English literary scholar, known especially for his modern English version of Geoffrey Chaucer's ''Canterbury Tales''.
Life
His father was Sir Egerton Coghill, 5th ...
, Alistair Sandford
* 1938–41: No editions.
* 1942–3: Ian Davie,
John Heath-Stubbs
John Francis Alexander Heath-Stubbs (9 July 1918 – 26 December 2006) was an English poet and translator. He is known for verse influenced by classical myths, and for a long Arthurian poem, ''Artorius'' (1972).
Biography and works
Heath-Stub ...
* 1944–5: No editions
Post-War
* 1946: Roy Macnab, Gordon Swaine
* 1947:
Martin Starkie, Roy Macnab
* 1948:
Arthur Boyars,
Barry Harmer Barry may refer to:
People and fictional characters
* Barry (name), including lists of people with the given name, nickname or surname, as well as fictional characters with the given name
* Dancing Barry, stage name of Barry Richards (born c. 19 ...
* 1949:
Kingsley Amis
Sir Kingsley William Amis (16 April 1922 – 22 October 1995) was an English novelist, poet, critic, and teacher. He wrote more than 20 novels, six volumes of poetry, a memoir, short stories, radio and television scripts, and works of social an ...
, James Michie
* 1950: J. B. Donne,
Donald Watt
* 1951: J. B. Donne, Martin Seymour-Smith
* 1952: Derwent May, James Price
* 1953:
Donald Hall
Donald Andrew Hall Jr. (September 20, 1928 – June 23, 2018) was an American poet, writer, editor and literary critic. He was the author of over 50 books across several genres from children's literature, biography, memoir, essays, and includin ...
,
Geoffrey Hill
Sir Geoffrey William Hill, FRSL (18 June 1932 – 30 June 2016) was an English poet, professor emeritus of English literature and religion, and former co-director of the Editorial Institute, at Boston University. Hill has been considered to be ...
* 1954: Jonathan Price,
Anthony Thwaite
Anthony Simon Thwaite (23 June 1930 – 22 April 2021) was an English poet and critic, widely known as the editor of his friend Philip Larkin's collected poems and letters.
Early years and education
Born in Chester, England, to Yorkshire par ...
* 1955:
Adrian Mitchell
Adrian Mitchell FRSL (24 October 1932 – 20 December 2008) was an English poet, novelist and playwright. A former journalist, he became a noted figure on the British Left. For almost half a century he was the foremost poet of the country's Cam ...
, Richard Selig
* 1956:
Bernard Donoughue
Bernard Donoughue, Baron Donoughue (born 8 September 1934) is a Labour Party (UK), British Labour Party politician, academic, businessman and author.[Roger Lonsdale
Roger Harrison Lonsdale, FBA (6 August 1934 – 28 February 2022) was a British literary scholar and academic born in Hornsea, East Riding of Yorkshire. He was a Fellow and Tutor at Balliol College Oxford from 1963 to 2000, and Professor of Engli ...]
, Judy Spink
* 1960:.
John Fuller, Francis Hope
* 1961–9: No editions.
* 1970: Mark Wormald, Robin Leanse
''Oxford Poetry'' re-launched
* June 1983:
Mick Imlah
Michael Ogilvie Imlah (26 September 1956 – 12 January 2009), better known as Mick Imlah, was a Scottish poet and editor.
Background
Imlah was brought up in Milngavie near Glasgow, before moving to Beckenham, Kent, in 1966. He was educated at Ma ...
, Nicholas Jenkins,
Elise Paschen
Elise Paschen (born January 1959) is an American poet and member of the Osage Nation. She is the co-founder and co-editor of Poetry in Motion, a program which places poetry posters in subways and buses across the country.
Career and education
Th ...
, Nicola Richards
* Autumn 1983: Nicholas Jenkins, Elise Paschen, Nicola Richards
* 1984–5: Nicholas Jenkins,
Bernard O'Donoghue
Bernard O'Donoghue FRSL (born 1945) is a contemporary Irish poet and academic.
Early life and education
Bernard O'Donoghue was born on 14 December 1945 in Cullen, County Cork, Ireland, where he lived on a farm. “My father was a terrible and r ...
,
Peter McDonald, Elise Paschen
* Winter 1986:
Mark Ford, Nicholas Jenkins,
John Lanchester
John Henry Lanchester (born 25 February 1962) is a British journalist and novelist. He was born in Hamburg, brought up in Hong Kong and educated in England; between 1972 and 1980 at Gresham's School in Holt, Norfolk, then at St John's College, ...
, Elise Paschen
* Summer 1987: Mark Ford, Elise Paschen, Mark Wormald
* Winter 1987: Elise Paschen, Mark Wormald
* 1988: Mark Wormald, Sarah Dence, Bernard O'Donoghue, Janice Whitten
* 1989–91: Mark Wormald
* Summer 1992: Sinéad Garrigan, Kate Reeves, Mark Wormald
* Winter 1992: Sinéad Garrigan, Kate Reeves
* Summer 1993: Sinéad Garrigan, Kate Reeves, Ian Samson
* Winter 1993: Sinéad Garrigan, Ian Samson
* Summer 1994: Sinéad Garrigan, Ian Samson
* Winter 1994. Sinéad Garrigan, Sam Leith
* 1995: Sinéad Garrigan, Sam Leith
* 1996–7: No editions.
* Easter 1998:
Graham Nelson
Graham A. Nelson (born 1968) is a British mathematician, poet, and the creator of the Inform design system for creating interactive fiction (IF) games. He has authored several IF games, including ''Curses'' (1993) and ''Jigsaw'' (1995).
Educati ...
, Gillian Pachter,
Robert Macfarlane
* Winter 1998: Graham Nelson, Robert Macfarlane
* 1999: Graham Nelson, Jane Griffiths
* 2000: Graham Nelson, Jane Griffiths, Jenni Nuttall
21st century
* 2003:
Carmen Bugan,
Kelly Grovier
Kelly Grovier is an American poet, historian, and art critic.
Background
Grovier was educated at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he received the school's Outstanding Senior of the Year Award upon graduation, and at Oxford Unive ...
, Sarah Hesketh
* 2004:
Carmen Bugan, Kelly Grovier, Sinéad Sturgeon
* 2006:
Carmen Bugan, Kelly Grovier, Richard Rowley, Sinéad Sturgeon
* 2007: Paul Thomas Abbott
* 2008: Benjamin Mullen, J. C. H. Potts
* 2009–2011: Hamid Khanbhai, Thomas A. Richards
* 2012–2014: Lavinia Singer, Aime Williams
* 2015–2016:
Mika Ross-Southall,
Lavinia Singer,
Andrew Wynn Owen
* 2017:
Nancy Campbell
Nancy Campbell is a British poet, non-fiction writer and publisher of artist's books. Her first collection of poetry, ''Disko Bay'' (2015), was shortlisted for the Forward Prize for Best First Collection. Other works include ''The Library of Ice' ...
,
Mary Jean Chan
Mary Jean Chan is a Hong Kong Chinese poet, lecturer, editor and critic. Their first poetry collection, ''Flèche'', won the 2019 Costa Book Award in the Poetry category. Chan is also a 2019 recipient of an Eric Gregory Award for a collecti ...
,
Theophilus Kwek
* 2018–2020:
Mary Jean Chan
Mary Jean Chan is a Hong Kong Chinese poet, lecturer, editor and critic. Their first poetry collection, ''Flèche'', won the 2019 Costa Book Award in the Poetry category. Chan is also a 2019 recipient of an Eric Gregory Award for a collecti ...
,
Theophilus Kwek,
Jay Bernard Jay Bernard may refer to:
*Jay Bernard (writer)
Jay Bernard (born 1988), FRSL, is a British writer, artist, film programmer, and activist from London, UK. Bernard has been a programmer at BFI Flare since 2014, co-editor of ''Oxford Poetry'', an ...
, Luke Allan
*2021–: Luke Allan
See also
* ''
The Oxford Magazine
''The Oxford Magazine'' is a review magazine and newspaper published in Oxford, England.[''The Oxford Magazi ...](_blank)
''
References
External links
''Oxford Poetry'' homepagenbsp;— including online texts
*
{{Authority control
Magazines established in 1910
English poetry
Literary magazines published in the United Kingdom
Mass media in Oxford
Poetry magazines published in the United Kingdom
Biannual magazines published in the United Kingdom