1909 in poetry

Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature (for instance, Irish or France).

Events

 * Andrew Cecil Bradley, Oxford Lectures on Poetry
 * Founding of the Poetry Recital Society (now the Poetry Society)
 * T.E. Hulme leaves the Poets' Club, and starts meeting with F.S. Flint and other poets in a new group which Hulme referred to as the 'Secession Club'; they meet at the Eiffel Tower restaurant in London's Soho district to discuss plans to reform contemporary poetry through free verse and the tanka and haiku and the removal of all unnecessary verbiage from poems. In April, Ezra Pound is introduced to the group and joins it.

Canada

 * May Austin Low, Confession, and Other Verses.
 * Tom McInnes, Lonesome Bar and Other Poems (much of the book was reprinted in In Amber Lands 1910)
 * Robert W. Service, Ballads of a Cheechako
 * E.W. Thomson, The Many-Mansioned House and Other Poems

United Kingdom

 * Laurence Binyon, England, and Other Poems
 * Joseph Campbell, The Mountainy Singer
 * Roby Datta, Echoes from the East and West to which are added stray notes of Mine Own, edited by Roby Datta, Cambridge: Galloway and Porter, Indian poet, writing in English, published in the United Kingdom
 * John Davidson, Fleet Street, and Other Poems
 * Thomas Hardy, Time's Laughingstocks, and Other Verses
 * George Meredith, Last Poems
 * Alfred Noyes, The Enchanted Island, and Other Poems
 * Ezra Pound, American poet published in the United Kingdom:
 * Personae
 * Exultations
 * The Poets' Club publishes two anthologies: For Christmas MDCCCCVIII (January 1909) and The Book of the Poets' Club (December) including the first examples of Imagist poetry
 * James Stephens, Insurrections, Irish poet published in the United Kingdom
 * John Millington Synge, Poems and Translations, preface by W. B. Yeats, Irish poet published in the United Kingdom

United States

 * Ambrose Bierce, Collected Works, including poetry, published in 12 volumes from this year to 1912
 * Florence Earle Coates, Lyrics of Life
 * Francis M. Finch, The Blue and the Gray and other verses, published posthumously (the author died in 1907), with an introduction by Andrew Dickson White, "and a portrait of the author"; New York: Henry Holt and Company
 * Louise Imogen Guiney, Happy Ending
 * James Oppenheim, Monday Morning
 * Ezra Pound, American poet published in the United Kingdom:
 * Personae
 * Exultations
 * Lizette Woodworth Reese, A Wayside Lute
 * Robert Service, Ballads of a Cheechako
 * George Sterling, A Wine of Wizardry
 * William Carlos Williams, Poems

Other in English

 * Roby Datta, Echoes from the East and West to which are added stray notes of Mine Own, edited by Roby Datta, Cambridge: Galloway and Porter, Indian poet, writing in English, published in the United Kingdom
 * James Stephens, Insurrections, Irish poet published in the United Kingdom
 * John Millington Synge, Poems and Translations, preface by W. B. Yeats, Irish poet published in the United Kingdom

India

 * Kerala Varma Valia Koyittampuran, ' 'Deiva Yogam' ', a short narrative poem, India, Malayalam-language

Telugu language

 * Chellapilla Venkata Sastry and Divakarla Tirupati Sastry:
 * Panigrihita
 * Sravananandam
 * Chilakamarti Lakshminarasimham, Gayopakhyanam, verse drama about the mythological Gaya, devotee of Lord Krishna
 * Rayaprolu Subba Rao, Lalitha

Other

 * Jean Cocteau, La Lampe d'Aladin, published when the author was 20 years old; France
 * Yone Noguchi, The Pilgrimage, Japan

Births
Death years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
 * February 14 – A.M. Klein (died 1972) Ukrainian-born Canadian poet, essayist and author of short stories
 * February 28 – Stephen Spender (died 1995), English poet, novelist and essayist who concentrated on themes of social injustice and the class struggle
 * May 1 – Yannis Ritsos (died 1990), Greek
 * May 9 – Robert Garioch (died 1981), a Scots-language poet, translator, and key member in the literary revival of the language in the mid-20th century
 * July 18 – Bishnu Dey (died 1982) Bengali poet, prose writer and movie critic
 * July 19 – Balamani Amma, Indian, Malayalam-language poet, a woman
 * July 27 – Charles Brasch (died 1973), a New Zealand poet, literary editor, arts patron and founding editor of the literary journal Landfall
 * October 4 – P. Kunhiraman Nair (died 1978), Indian, Malayalam-language poet
 * October 12 – Dorothy Livesay (died 1996), Canadian poet
 * November 16 – Michio Mado, Japanese poet who worked for the Office of the Governor-General of Taiwan
 * December 15 – John Glassco (died 1981) Canadian poet, memoirist, and pornographer
 * Also:
 * Beatrice Davis (died 1992), Australian
 * John Glassco (died 1981), Canadian poet, memoirist and novelist
 * Elder Olson, American
 * Edappalli Raghavan Pillai (died 1936), Indian, Malayalam-language poet
 * W. R. Rodgers (died 1969), Irish poet, essayist, book reviewer, radio broadcaster, script writer, lecturer, teacher and Presbyterian minister

Deaths

 * March 23 – John Davidson (born 1857), Scottish poet and playwright
 * March 24 – John Millington Synge, Irish playwright, poet, prose writer and collector of folklore
 * April 10 – Algernon Charles Swinburne, English poet
 * May 18 – George Meredith, English novelist and poet
 * June 24 – Sarah Orne Jewett, 59, American novelist,short story writer, and poet
 * August 21 – George Cabot Lodge (born 1873, American
 * November 30 – Romesh Chundar Dutt (born 1848), writer of Indian poetry in English; cousin of Toru Dutt
 * November 10 – George Essex Evans (born 1863), Australian
 * Also:
 * John Bannister Tabb, American
 * Richard Watson Gilder, American poet and editor
 * William T. Goodge (born 1862), Australian
 * William Reed Huntington (born 1838), American Episcopal priest, author and poet
 * Nabinchandra Sen (born 1847), Bengali poet and writer