We keep you updated on the world of poetry with our news roundups.
James Monroe Whitfield was a 19th century poet and political activist on behalf of African Americans. He was born on April 10, 1822 in New Hampshire. There are only scant records of his early years but it is known that he received very little in the way of formal education so it can be assumed that he was pretty much self-taught in many respects. ...
Today at My Poetic Side we contemplate “First they came” on the 125th anniversary of the birth of its creator, and we look at a previously unknown side of Siegfried Sassoon as a new opera “Silver Birch” takes place. Niemöller – The Pastor who clashed with Hitler 2017 marks the 125th anniversary of the birth of Pastor Martin Niemöller, a rather remarkable German ...
James Kenneth Stephen was a 19th century English poet. He also held the privileged position of private tutor to the Prince of Wales’s son, Prince Albert Victor. He was born into affluent circumstances in London on the 25th February 1859, the son of barrister-at-law Sir James Fitzjames Stephen. He had at least one notable literary family connection in the Bloomsbury Group writer Virginia ...
John Farrell, an Argentinean-born Australian poet, journalist, gold digger and brewer, was born on the 18th December 1851 in Buenos Aires, to a chemist who had emigrated with his wife from Dublin four years earlier. Within a year the family were on the move again, this time heading for Victoria where Mr Farrell tried his hand at prospecting for gold, and then ...
In today’s poetry round up, big things are being planned by the BBC for National Poetry Day this Year, and a 300-year old poetry book becomes an intriguing, if not slightly gruesome, work of art, Four Day Spoken Word Extravaganza National Poetry Day this year will fall on 28th September and the BBC are planning to celebrate in a huge way. A four-day extravaganza ...
Poetry – does the mere mention of it transport you back to the classroom and the type of lessons where the whole class were forced to study the same poem; delving into the wording and trying to unravel exactly what the poet meant? Perhaps you were fortunate enough to have the type of teacher who brought poetry to life for you; making the written words truly come alive for the ...
John Bernard O"Hara was a poet and distinguished schoolmaster in Australia. He was born on the 29th October 1862 in the Central Victorian town of Bendigo, the son of a minor Irish-born poet and teacher at a primary school. He survived his school days unscathed despite severe financial troubles which led to the loss of the family home. He was a very able young ...
Today’s stories include new about a rare volume of poetry that will shortly be up for auction, the inspiration behind a very successful poetry festival in Uganda and a poem that took the poet rather longer to write than he would probably have liked. J.R.R. Tolkien Poetry Under the Hammer If you are a fan of Tolkien and would love the opportunity to own ...
Once again here at My Poetic Side, we start the week with the sad news that another prominent poet has passed away. Noted Urdu poet, critic and writer Hasan Akbar Kamal passed away at the age of 71, late on Friday in a private hospital, he had a number of medical conditions and had been struggling with ill health. In addition to his ...
John Barlas was a poet and revolutionary socialist political activist who was often known in literary circles by the pseudonym Evelyn Douglas. He had at least eight books of Swinburnean-influenced verse published and he was known to favour the Decadent Movement of arts and literature. This was a Western Europe-wide concept that emphasised an “aesthetic ideology of excess and artificiality” Examples of work ...
