Just uploaded: a new article discussing the association between ‘Poet of the Poor’ Wilfrid Gibson, and Sylvia Pankhurst’s socialist feminist paper The Woman’s Dreadnought. The connection illustrates the interwoven social, political and cultural networks of the time, and how for Gibson, poetry was a form of activism. His work was amongst the many different ways … Continue reading New in June 2026: Dreadnoughts: Wilfrid Gibson, Sylvia Pankhurst and The Woman’s Dreadnought →
2026 Between 1914 and 1921, work by poet Wilfrid Gibson appeared in Sylvia Pankhurst’s socialist feminist paper the Woman’s Dreadnought. Their association throws light on the interwoven social, political and cultural networks of the time, and on Gibson’s commitment to ‘Art for Life’s Sake’: poetry as a form of activism.
Reminding us that the horrors of war extend far beyond the battlefield, Wilfrid Gibson’s poem ‘Katherine Veitch’ tells of a mother driven to madness by the loss of her son at the battle of Loos in 1915. Gibson, one of the first poets to write about World War 1, had previously described soldiers with shell-shock; … Continue reading A Poem for Armistice Day 2025: Katherine Veitch by Wilfrid Gibson →
2024. When British poet and aphorist Elizabeth Gibson Cheyne described herself in ‘Who’s Who’ as a suffragist, socialist and freethinker, she was actively constructing a public identity not just as a writer, but as an activist. But identities can’t be so neatly categorised and controlled. Paper given at the Womens’ History Network annual conference.
This lesser-known war poem by Wilfrid Gibson was written shortly after the birth of his first child, Audrey, on May 31, 1916. It remains all too relevant today One-Day-Old Baby asleep on my arm, Would that my heart could enfold you, Cherish you, shelter you, hold you Ever from harm. Born in a season of … Continue reading For Armistice Day 2023: poem by Wilfrid Gibson →
Here are four poems for Armistice Day, by Wilfrid Gibson. Best known for his poems of the First World War, he continued to write about war and its aftermath until the Second World War. For more of his war poems, see Suspense and War Poems Bacchanal (November, 1918) Into the twilight of Trafalgar Square They … Continue reading Wilfrid Gibson poems for Armistice Day, November 2018 →
This weekend sees the final days of an installation, Dazzle at London’s V&A, centred around Wilfrid Gibson’s war poem Suspense. The installation is one of a series inspired by the use of ‘dazzle’ camouflage used to reduce the risks of submarine attacks on shipping in World War One. Suspense draws on Gibson’s own experience of … Continue reading Wilfrid Gibson Dazzles at the V&A with his poem ‘Suspense’ →
2016. Compares the changing responses to the First World War in the writings of Wilfrid Gibson and his sister and fellow poet Elizabeth Gibson Cheyne. Revised version of article published in Dymock Poets and Friends, No 15.
I have uploaded four more war poems by Wilfrid Gibson and one by Elizabeth Gibson Cheyne. They are among those mentioned in my latest article, ‘”War is a business of innumerable personal tragedies”: Wilfrid Gibson, Elizabeth Gibson Cheyne and the First World War’. (Published this month in Dymock Poets and Friends, No 15, 2016, it … Continue reading New in March 2016: more war poems by Wilfrid Gibson and Elizabeth Gibson Cheyne →
Wilfrid Gibson’s poem ‘Devilswater’, set to music by James Gillespie, appears on the recently launched Brothers Gillespie CD, Songs from the Outlands. The poem, which refers to places near Hexham, Gibson’s Northumberland hometown, was influenced by the regional folk tales and Border Ballads he heard from childhood; I think Gibson would have loved the Gillespies’ … Continue reading New in February 2016: Wilfrid Gibson’s ‘Devilswater’ →