W. S. Graham
Encyclopedia
William Sydney Graham was a Scottish
poet who is often associated with Dylan Thomas
and the neo-romantic
group of poets. Graham's poetry was mostly overlooked in his lifetime but, partly due to the support of Harold Pinter
, his work has enjoyed a revival in recent years. He was represented in the second edition of the Penguin Book of Contemporary Verse (Harmondsworth, UK, 1962) and the Anthology of Twentieth-Century British and Irish Poetry
(Oxford University Press, 2001).
. In 1932, he left school to become an apprentice draughtsman and then studied structural engineering at Stow College
, Glasgow
. He was awarded a bursary to study literature for a year at Newbattle Abbey College in 1938. Graham spent the war
years working at a number of jobs in Scotland and Ireland
before moving to Cornwall
in 1944. His first book, Cage Without Grievance was published in 1942.
(1948) and The White Threshold (1949). The style of these early poems led critics to see Graham as part of the neo-romantic group that included Dylan Thomas and George Barker
. The affinities between these three poets derive from a common interest in poets like Gerard Manley Hopkins
, Arthur Rimbaud
and Hart Crane
, and, in the cases of Thomas and Graham, a taste for the Bohemian lifestyle of the London
literary scene.
In 1948, after spending a year on a reading touring of the United States, which included a small amount of teaching at New York University
, he moved to London to be nearer the hub of that Bohemian world. Here he came into contact with T. S. Eliot
, then editor of Faber and Faber who published The White Threshold and who were to remain Graham's publishers for the rest of his life.
artists colony. Here he became friendly with several of the resident painters, including Bryan Wynter
and Roger Hilton
. The following year, Faber and Faber published his The Nightfishing, a book whose title poem is marked a dramatic change in Graham's poetry. The poem moved on from his earlier style and a move away from the neo-romantic/apocalyptic tag. Unfortunately for the poet, the poem's appearance coincided with the rise of the Movement with their open hostility to the neo-romantics, and, despite the support of Eliot and Hugh MacDiarmid
, the book was neither a critical nor a popular success.
It was to be fifteen years before Graham published another book, Malcolm Mooney's Land (1970). This, and his last book, "Implements In Their Places" are a truly original and enduring poetic achievements, for which Graham is only slowly coming to be recognised.
For many years, he had been living in semi-poverty on his income as a writer, but in 1974 he received a Civil List pension
of £500 per year. Perhaps because of this alleviation of his financial circumstances, Graham began to publish with more frequency, with Implements in their Places (1977), Collected Poems 1942-1977 (1979) and an American-published Selected Poems (1980). He died in Madron
, Cornwall
in 1986. His last collection Aimed at Nobody was published posthumously in 1993 and a book of Uncollected Poems appeared in 1990. Faber brought out a new Selected Poems in 1996. The Nightfisherman: Selected Letters was published in 1999 and New Collected Poems in 2005.
As this posthumous publication activity indicates, Graham's reputation has grown in recent years. Some might argue this is partly due to Harold Pinter's often-expressed enthusiasm for the poet, or attribute his increasing recognition to the widespread advocacy of poets associated with the British Poetry Revival
. However Graham's work was represented in the anthology Conductors of Chaos (1996) by a selection introduced by the poet and critic Tony Lopez, who also wrote a book-length study, The Poetry of W. S. Graham (1989).
He married another poet, Agnes Kilpatrick Dunsmuir (1909–1999), known as "Nessie Dunsmuir". He died on 9 January 1986.
In 2006, 20 years after his death, memorial plaques were unveiled in Fore Street Madron
where he spent his final years, and at his birthplace, 1 Hope St Greenock
.
Scotland
Scotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
poet who is often associated with Dylan Thomas
Dylan Thomas
Dylan Marlais Thomas was a Welsh poet and writer, Encyclopædia Britannica. Retrieved 11 January 2008. who wrote exclusively in English. In addition to poetry, he wrote short stories and scripts for film and radio, which he often performed himself...
and the neo-romantic
Neo-romanticism
The term neo-romanticism is used to cover a variety of movements in music, painting and architecture. It has been used with reference to very late 19th century and early 20th century composers such as Gustav Mahler particularly by Carl Dahlhaus who uses it as synonymous with late Romanticism...
group of poets. Graham's poetry was mostly overlooked in his lifetime but, partly due to the support of Harold Pinter
Harold Pinter
Harold Pinter, CH, CBE was a Nobel Prize–winning English playwright and screenwriter. One of the most influential modern British dramatists, his writing career spanned more than 50 years. His best-known plays include The Birthday Party , The Homecoming , and Betrayal , each of which he adapted to...
, his work has enjoyed a revival in recent years. He was represented in the second edition of the Penguin Book of Contemporary Verse (Harmondsworth, UK, 1962) and the Anthology of Twentieth-Century British and Irish Poetry
Anthology of Twentieth-Century British and Irish Poetry
Anthology of Twentieth-Century British and Irish Poetry is a poetry anthology edited by Keith Tuma, and published in 2001 by Oxford University Press...
(Oxford University Press, 2001).
Early life and work
Graham was born in GreenockGreenock
Greenock is a town and administrative centre in the Inverclyde council area in United Kingdom, and a former burgh within the historic county of Renfrewshire, located in the west central Lowlands of Scotland...
. In 1932, he left school to become an apprentice draughtsman and then studied structural engineering at Stow College
Stow College
-History:The college is named after David Stow, whose primary teaching seminary was founded close to the college at Dundasvale. Stow was the first purpose-built Further Education college in Glasgow, celebrating its 75th anniversary in 2009....
, Glasgow
Glasgow
Glasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...
. He was awarded a bursary to study literature for a year at Newbattle Abbey College in 1938. Graham spent the war
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
years working at a number of jobs in Scotland and Ireland
Ireland
Ireland is an island to the northwest of continental Europe. It is the third-largest island in Europe and the twentieth-largest island on Earth...
before moving to Cornwall
Cornwall
Cornwall is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of , and covers an area of...
in 1944. His first book, Cage Without Grievance was published in 1942.
Graham and the neo-romantics
The 1940s were prolific years for Graham, and he published four more books during that decade. These were The Seven Journeys (1944)' 2ND Poems (1945), The Voyages of Alfred WallisAlfred Wallis
Alfred Wallis was a Cornish fisherman and artist.Wallis's parents, Charles and Jane Wallis were from Penzance in Cornwall and moved to Devonport, Devon to find work in 1850 where Alfred and his brother Charles were born. Shortly after this the children's mother died and this prompted the family to...
(1948) and The White Threshold (1949). The style of these early poems led critics to see Graham as part of the neo-romantic group that included Dylan Thomas and George Barker
George Barker (poet)
George Granville Barker was an English poet and author.-Life and work:Barker was born in Loughton, near Epping Forest in Essex, England, elder brother of Kit Barker [painter] George Barker was raised by his Irish mother and English father in Battersea, London. He was educated at an L.C.C. school...
. The affinities between these three poets derive from a common interest in poets like Gerard Manley Hopkins
Gerard Manley Hopkins
Gerard Manley Hopkins, S.J. was an English poet, Roman Catholic convert, and Jesuit priest, whose posthumous 20th-century fame established him among the leading Victorian poets...
, Arthur Rimbaud
Arthur Rimbaud
Jean Nicolas Arthur Rimbaud was a French poet. Born in Charleville, Ardennes, he produced his best known works while still in his late teens—Victor Hugo described him at the time as "an infant Shakespeare"—and he gave up creative writing altogether before the age of 21. As part of the decadent...
and Hart Crane
Hart Crane
-Career:Throughout the early 1920s, small but well-respected literary magazines published some of Crane’s lyrics, gaining him, among the avant-garde, a respect that White Buildings , his first volume, ratified and strengthened...
, and, in the cases of Thomas and Graham, a taste for the Bohemian lifestyle of the London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
literary scene.
In 1948, after spending a year on a reading touring of the United States, which included a small amount of teaching at New York University
New York University
New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...
, he moved to London to be nearer the hub of that Bohemian world. Here he came into contact with T. S. Eliot
T. S. Eliot
Thomas Stearns "T. S." Eliot OM was a playwright, literary critic, and arguably the most important English-language poet of the 20th century. Although he was born an American he moved to the United Kingdom in 1914 and was naturalised as a British subject in 1927 at age 39.The poem that made his...
, then editor of Faber and Faber who published The White Threshold and who were to remain Graham's publishers for the rest of his life.
The Nightfishing and after
In 1954, Graham returned to Cornwall to live near the St. IvesSt Ives, Cornwall
St Ives is a seaside town, civil parish and port in Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. The town lies north of Penzance and west of Camborne on the coast of the Celtic Sea. In former times it was commercially dependent on fishing. The decline in fishing, however, caused a shift in commercial...
artists colony. Here he became friendly with several of the resident painters, including Bryan Wynter
Bryan Wynter
Bryan Wynter was one of the St. Ives group of British painters. His work was mainly abstract, drawing upon nature for inspiration....
and Roger Hilton
Roger Hilton
Roger Hilton CBE was a pioneer of abstract art in post-war Britain. He was born in 1911 in Northwood, London and studied at the Slade School of Fine Art, London under Henry Tonks and also in Paris, where he developed links with painters on the Continent.In World War II he served in the Army, part...
. The following year, Faber and Faber published his The Nightfishing, a book whose title poem is marked a dramatic change in Graham's poetry. The poem moved on from his earlier style and a move away from the neo-romantic/apocalyptic tag. Unfortunately for the poet, the poem's appearance coincided with the rise of the Movement with their open hostility to the neo-romantics, and, despite the support of Eliot and Hugh MacDiarmid
Hugh MacDiarmid
Hugh MacDiarmid is the pen name of Christopher Murray Grieve , a significant Scottish poet of the 20th century. He was instrumental in creating a Scottish version of modernism and was a leading light in the Scottish Renaissance of the 20th century...
, the book was neither a critical nor a popular success.
It was to be fifteen years before Graham published another book, Malcolm Mooney's Land (1970). This, and his last book, "Implements In Their Places" are a truly original and enduring poetic achievements, for which Graham is only slowly coming to be recognised.
For many years, he had been living in semi-poverty on his income as a writer, but in 1974 he received a Civil List pension
Civil List Act 1837
The Civil List Act 1837 was an Act of Parliament in the United Kingdom, signed into law on 23 December 1837.It reiterated the principles of the civil list system, stating that the newly-accessioned Queen Victoria undertook to transfer all hereditary revenues of the Crown to the Treasury during her...
of £500 per year. Perhaps because of this alleviation of his financial circumstances, Graham began to publish with more frequency, with Implements in their Places (1977), Collected Poems 1942-1977 (1979) and an American-published Selected Poems (1980). He died in Madron
Madron
Madron is a civil parish and village in west Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is a large rural parish on the Penwith peninsula north of Penzance.Madron village is situated approximately two miles northwest of Penzance town centre....
, Cornwall
Cornwall
Cornwall is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of , and covers an area of...
in 1986. His last collection Aimed at Nobody was published posthumously in 1993 and a book of Uncollected Poems appeared in 1990. Faber brought out a new Selected Poems in 1996. The Nightfisherman: Selected Letters was published in 1999 and New Collected Poems in 2005.
As this posthumous publication activity indicates, Graham's reputation has grown in recent years. Some might argue this is partly due to Harold Pinter's often-expressed enthusiasm for the poet, or attribute his increasing recognition to the widespread advocacy of poets associated with the British Poetry Revival
British Poetry Revival
The British Poetry Revival is the general name given to a loose poetry movement in Britain that took place in the 1960s and 1970s. The revival was a modernist-inspired reaction to the Movement's more conservative approach to British poetry.-Beginnings:...
. However Graham's work was represented in the anthology Conductors of Chaos (1996) by a selection introduced by the poet and critic Tony Lopez, who also wrote a book-length study, The Poetry of W. S. Graham (1989).
Marriage, death and recognition
In 2006, 20 years after his death, memorial plaques were unveiled in Fore Street Madron
Madron
Madron is a civil parish and village in west Cornwall, United Kingdom. It is a large rural parish on the Penwith peninsula north of Penzance.Madron village is situated approximately two miles northwest of Penzance town centre....
where he spent his final years, and at his birthplace, 1 Hope St Greenock
Greenock
Greenock is a town and administrative centre in the Inverclyde council area in United Kingdom, and a former burgh within the historic county of Renfrewshire, located in the west central Lowlands of Scotland...
.
See also
- Scottish literatureScottish literatureScottish literature is literature written in Scotland or by Scottish writers. It includes literature written in English, Scottish Gaelic, Scots, Brythonic, French, Latin and any other language in which a piece of literature was ever written within the boundaries of modern Scotland.The earliest...
- New Collected Poems, edited by Matthew Francis and with a foreword by Douglas Dunn: Faber and Faber; (2005) ISBN 0571209890 ISBN 978-0571209897
External links
- Short introduction to Graham with links to poems
- Pinter on Graham
- Review of The Nightfisherman: Selected Letters, edited by Michael and Margaret Snow. Manchester: Carcanet. by Dennis O'Driscoll in Thumbscrew No. 16 (2000), "On Pancakes Alone"
- Review of The Nightfisherman: Selected Letters, edited by Michael and Margaret Snow. by James Keery in PN Review, "HIS PERFECT HUNGER'S DAILY CHANGING BREAD"
- W S Graham: speaking towards you, edited by Ralph Pite and Hester Jones, Liverpool University Press ISBN 0853235791 - some pages available on Googlebooks
- W.S. Graham fonds at University of Victoria, Special Collections