Wilfrid Wilson Gibson

Wilfrid Wilson Gibson (2 October 1878 - 26 May 1962) was an English poet, one of the Georgian poets.

Gibson was one of the founders of the Dymock Poets, a community of writers who settled briefly, before the outbreak of World War I, in the village of Dymock in north Gloucestershire.

Life
Gibson was born in Hexham, Northumberland.

He began publishing poems in magazines in 1895, and the collections Stonefolds, On The Threshold, were published by the Wayland publishers in 1914, and followed by The Web of Life in 1908. During the early part of his writing life, Wilfrid Wilson Gibson wrote poems that featured the "macabre." One such poem is Flannan Isle, based on a real life mystery.

Gibson left the north for London in 1914 after his mother died. Despite his residence in London and later on in Gloucestershire, many of Gibson's poems both then and later, have Northumberland settings: Hexham's Market Cross; Hareshaw; and The Kielder Stone. Others deal with poverty and passion amid wild Northumbrian landscapes. Still others are devoted to fishermen, industrial workers and miners, often alluding to local ballads and the rich folk-song heritage of the North East.

It was in London that he met both Edward Marsh and Rupert Brooke, becoming a close friend and later Brooke's literary executor (with Lascelles Abercrombie and Walter de la Mare). This was at the period when the first Georgian Poetry poetry anthology was being planned. Gibson was one of the insiders.

Recognition
While Gibson's reputation was eclipsed somewhat by the Ezra Pound-T.S. Eliot school of Modernist poetry, his work remained popular.

His poetry was included by Yeats in the 1936 Oxford Book of Modern Verse.

Poetry

 * The Mountain Lovers. London: Elkin Mathews, 1902.
 * The Queen's Vigil, and other song. London: Elkin Mathews, 1902.
 * Urlyn the Harper, and other song. London: Elkin Mathews, 1902.
 * The Golden Helm, and other verse. London: Elkin Mathews, 1903.
 * The Nets of Love. London: Elkin Mathews, 1905.
 * On the Threshold. Cranleigh, Surrey, UK: Samurai Press, 1907.
 * The Web of Life: A book of poems. Cranleigh, Surrey, UK: Samurai Press, 1908.
 * Akra the Slave. London: Elkin Mathews, 1910.
 * Fires, Book I: *The Stone, and other tales. London: Elkin Mathews, 1912.
 * Fires, Book II: The ovens, and other tales. London: Elkin Mathews, 1912.
 * Fires, Book III: The Hare, and other tales. London: Elkin Mathews, 1912.
 * Fires (Books I-III). . London: Elkin Mathews, 1912; New York: Macmillan, 1912.
 * Borderlands. London: Elkin Mathews, 1914.
 * Thoroughfares. London: Elkin Mathews, 1914.
 * Borderlands and Thoroughfares. New York: Macmillan, 1914.
 * New Numbers (by Wilfrid Wilson Gibson, Rupert Brooke, Lascelles Abercrombie, & John Drinkwater). Ryton, Dymock, Gloucester, UK: Crypt House Press, 1914.
 * Battle. London: Elkin Mathews, 1915
 * published in U.S. as Battle, and other poems. London: Elkin Mathews, 1916.
 * Friends. London: Elkin Mathews, 1916.
 * Poems, 1904-1917. New York: Macmillan, 1917.
 * Livelihood: Dramatic reveries. London & New York: Macmillan, 1917.
 * Hill-tracks. New York: Macmillan, 1918.
 * Whin. London: Macmillan, 1918.
 * Twenty-three Selected Poems. London: Atheneum Literature Dept., 1919.
 * Home: A book of poems. Westminster, UK: C.W. Beaumont, 1920.
 * Neighbours. London & New York: Macmillan, 1920.
 * Krindlesyke. London: Macmillan, 1922.
 * Sixty-three Poems (selected by Edward Adams Parker). London: Macmillan, 1924.
 * I Heard a Sailor. London: Macmillan, 1925.
 * Collected Poems, 1905-1925. London: Macmillan, 1925.
 * The Early Whistler (illustrated by John Nash). London: Faber & Gwyer (Ariel Poems No. 6), 1927; New York: William Edwin Rudge, 1927.
 * The Golden Room, and other poems. London: Macmillan, 1928.
 * Hazards. London: Macmillan, 1930.
 * Wilfrid Wilson Gibson. London: Ernest Benn (Augustan Poets), 1931.
 * Highland Dawn. Bradford, UK: Beamsley House, 1932.
 * Islands: Poems, 1930-1932. London: Macmillan, 1932.
 * Fuel (poems & a play in verse). London: Macmillan, 1934.
 * Coming and Going. London & New York: Oxford University Press, 1938.
 * The Alert. London & New York: Oxford University Press, 1941.
 * Challenge. London & New York: Oxford University Press, 1942.
 * The Searchlights. London & New York: Oxford University Press, 1943.
 * The Outpost. London & New York: Oxford University Press, 1944.
 * Solway Ford, and other poems (selected by Charles Williams). London: Faber, 1945.
 * Coldknuckles. London: Frederick Muller, 1947.
 * Homecoming: An anthology of one hundred and twenty-five poems celebrating the 125th anniversary of Wilfrid Wilson Gibson's birth. Steel, Hexham, Northumberland, UK: Wagtail Press, 2003.

Plays

 * The Stonefolds. Cranleigh, UK: Samurai Press, 1907
 * also published as Stonefolds. London: Elkin Mathews, 1916.
 * Daily Bread (18 verse plays). London: Elkin Mathews, 1910; New York: Macmillan, 1912.
 * Womenkind: A play in one act. London: David Nutt, 1912; New York: Macmillan, 1912.
 * Kestrel Edge, and other plays. London: Macmillan, 1924.
 * Between Fairs: A comedy. London: Macmillan, 1928.
 * Within Four Walls: Five short plays. London: Fortune Press, 1950.

Except where noted, bibliographical information courtesy WorldCat.

Mountain Lovers (1902)