1941 in poetry

Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature.

Events

January 20 – Chittadhar Hridaya begins a 6-year sentence of imprisonment in Kathmandu for writing poetry in Nepal Bhasa during which time he secretly composes his Buddhist epic Sugata Saurabha in the same language
Spring – The Antioch Review is founded as a literary magazine at Antioch College in Ohio
May 5 – Kingsley Amis and Philip Larkin meet while both reading English at St John's College, Oxford
August 18–19-year-old Pilot Officer John Gillespie Magee, Jr., American poet serving in Britain with the Royal Canadian Air Force, flies a high-altitude test flight in a Spitfire V from RAF Llandow in Wales and afterwards writes the sonnet "High Flight" about the experience ; on December 11 he dies in a collision over England
September 6–7 – Under Nazi occupation, Yiddish poet Abraham Sutzkever is among the Polish Jews interned in the Vilna Ghetto. He will escape and join the resistance in 1943. During the Nazi era, Sutzkever writes over 80 poems, whose manuscripts he manages to save for postwar publication
c. October – The first known reference to Babi Yar in poetry is written soon after the Babi Yar massacres by the young Jewish-Ukrainian poet from Kiev and an eyewitness, Liudmila Titova. Her poem "Babi Yar" will be discovered only in the 1990s
December – During the Siege of Leningrad, Yakov Druskin, ill and starving, and Maria Malich, the second wife of Russian avant-garde poet Danil Kharms, trudge across the city to Kharms' bombed-out apartment building and collect a trunk full of manuscripts which they hide through the 1940s and 1950s, even bringing them to Siberia, then covertly show them to others in the 1960s. Their actions save much of Kharms' work for posterity as well as that of fellow poet Alexander Vvedensky. Vvedensky, arrested in September in Kharkov for "counterrevolutionary agitation", was evacuated but died of pleurisy en route
The surrealist magazine VVV is founded in New York City by French poet André Breton and Marcel Duchamp, Max Ernst and David Hare

Works published in English

Listed by nation where the work was first published and again by the poet's native land, if different; substantially revised works listed separately:

Canada">Canadian poetry">Canada

Anne Marriott, Calling Adventurers!, Toronto: Ryerson Press.
E. J. Pratt, Dunkirk, Toronto: Macmillan.
Bertram Warr, Yet a Little Onwards, Broadsheet No. 3, Resurgam Younger Poets series, Favil Press.

India">Indian poetry">India, in English">Indian poetry in English">in English

Sri Aurobindo, Poems, Hyderabad: Government Central Press
Bimal Chandra Bose, Thought-Ray, Calcutta: Biman Panthi Publishing House
Baldoon Dhingra, Comes Ever the Dawn, Lahore: Ripon Press
Manjeri Sundaraman, Brief Orisons, Madras: Hurley Press
Thurairajah Tambimuttu, editor, Out of This War, London: Fortune Press; anthology; Indian poetry published in the United Kingdom
Hariprasad Sastri, editor and translator, Indian Mystic Verse, anthology

United Kingdom

W. H. Auden, New Year Letter, May, English poet living in the United States
Laurence Binyon, The North Star, and Other Poems
Edmund Blunden, Poems 1930–1940
Lilian Bowes Lyon, Tomorrow is a Revealing
T. S. Eliot, The Dry Salvages, published in New English Weekly, republished in Four Quartets, 1944A Choice of Kipling's Verse by T. S. Eliot, published December 1941
G. S. Fraser, The Fatal Landscape and Other Poems
Robert Greacen, The Bird, Northern Ireland poet
J. F. Hendry and Henry Treece, editors, The White Horseman, poetry anthology featuring poets in the New Apocalyptics movement
Louis MacNeice, Plant and Phantom
John Pudney, "For Johnny"
Keidrych Rhys, editor, Poems from the Forces: a collection of verses by serving members of the Navy, Army and Air Force
W. R. Rodgers, Awake! and Other Poems, Northern Ireland poet
Alan Ross, Summer Thunder
A. L. Rowse, Poems of a Decade
Sydney Goodsir Smith, Skail Wind, in Scots and English
Tambimuttu, editor, Out of This War, London: Fortune Press; anthology; Indian poetry in English, published in the United Kingdom
Terence Tiller, Poems, New Hogarth Library 5
Vernon Watkins, ''The Ballad of the Mari Lwyd, and Other Poems''

United States

W. H. Auden, The Double Man, published in March; later published as New Year Letter in the United Kingdom in May; English poet living in the United States
Stephen Vincent Benét, A Summons to the Free
John Peale Bishop, Selected Poems
Louise Bogan, Poems and New Poems
Paul Engle, West of Midnight
Kenneth Fearing, Dagger of the Mind
John Gould Fletcher, South Star
Robinson Jeffers, Be Angry at the Sun
Edgar Lee Masters, Illinois Poems
Josephine Miles, Poems on Several Occasions
Edna St. Vincent Millay, Collected Sonnets
Marianne Moore, What Are Years
John G. Neihardt, The Song of Jed Smith
Carl Rakosi, Selected Poems
John Crowe Ransom, The New Criticism, criticism
Charles Reznikoff, Going To and Fro and Walking Up and Down, self-published
Theodore Roethke, Open House
Winfield Townley Scott, Wind the Clock
Ridgely Torrence, Poems
Mark Van Doren, The Mayfield Deer
William Carlos Williams, The Broken Span
Louis Zukofsky, ''55 Poems''

Other in English

Allen Curnow, Island Time, New Zealand
Lesbia Harford, The Poems of Lesbia Harford, Australia
Rex Ingamells and John Ingamells, At a Boundary, Adelaide, written by two brothers, includes Reginald Ingamells' "The Gangrened People", Australia
Donagh MacDonagh, Veterans, and other poems, Ireland
R. A. K. Mason, The Dark Will Lighten, New Zealand

Works published in other languages

Listed by nation where the work was first published and again by the poet's native land, if different; substantially revised works listed separately:

France">French poetry">France

Louis Aragon, Le Creve-Coeur
Paul Éluard, pen name of Eugène Grindel, Le Livre ouvert, published from 1940 to this year
Luc Estang, Puissance du matin
Léon-Paul Fargue, ''Haute Solitude''

Indian subcontinent

Including all of the British colonies that later became India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal. Listed alphabetically by first name, regardless of surname:

Hindi">Hindi poetry">Hindi

Girija Kumar Mathur, Manjir, Indian, Hindi
Sumitra Kumari Sinha, Vihag, Hindi
Syed Kalbe Mustapha, Malik Muhammad Ja'isi, biography in Urdu of Malik Mohammad Jaisi, a Hindi poet of the 15th century, with descriptions of the poet's works

Other languages on the Indian subcontinent

Abanindranath Tagore and Rani Chanda, a memoir describing the lives of the family that included Rabindranath Tagore; a companion volume to Joda Sakor Dhare 1944 and Apan Katha 1946; Bengali
Ananta Pattanayak, Tarpana Kare Aji, Indian, Oriya-language
Baidyanath Mishra, also known as "Yatri", a dramatic monologue given by a child-widow character, told in colloquial language, a new development in Maithili poetry
Bawa Balwant, Maha Nac, Punjabi-language poems inspired by Marxist and left-leaning politics
Darshan Singh Awara, Main Bagi Han, Punjabi-language poems reflecting anger toward society as well as religious traditions and institutions
Dimbeswar Neog, Svahid Karbala, Assamese-language narrative poem on a tragedy at Karbala and the martyrdom of Hussain
Jyotsna Shukla, Akashnan Phool, Indian poet writing in Gujarati
Faiz Ahmad Faiz, Naqsh-e-Faryadi, Indian, Urdu-language
Hari Daryani, Hariscandra Jivana Katha, Sindhi-language
M. U. Malkani, Gitanjali, translation into Sindhi from the English of Rabindranath Thakur's book of the same name
Mohammad Mumtaz Ali, Amir Minasi, biography of the Urdu poet Amir Minai, including descriptions of Minai's works; written in Urdu
Narayan Bezbarua, Sakti Singa, Indian, Assamese
Pritam Singh Safir, Kattak Kunjam, Indian, Punjabi-language
Sri Chandra Singh, "Vadali", a Rajasthani-language nature poem in 130 verses which influenced Rajasthani poets for a generation
Wahab Pare of Hajin, Kashmiri Shahnama Firdosi, an adaptation in Kashmiri of the Persian classic poem by Firdousi; with a canto added at the end

Spanish language

José Santos Chocano, Oro de Indias, Peru
Gerardo Diego, Alondra de verdad, 42 sonnets on diverse topics; Spain
Federico García Lorca, Diván del Tamarit (Spanish for "The Diván of Tamarit", written in 1936, published posthumously this year; Spain
Gabriela Mistral, Antología: Selección de Gabriela Mistral, Santiago, Chile: Zig Zag

Other

Amir Hamzah, Buah Rindu, Dutch East Indies
Pier Paolo Pasolini, Versi a Casarsa, Friulian poetry published in Italy
Nima Yooshij, "Quqnūs", Iran

Awards and honors

Governor General's Award, poetry or drama: Calling Adventurers, Anne Marriott

United States

Frost Medal: Robert Frost
Pulitzer Prize for Poetry: Leonard Bacon: ''Sunderland Capture''

Births

Death years link to the corresponding " in poetry" article:

February 7 – Kevin Crossley-Holland, English poet and children's author
February 19 – Stephen Dobyns, American poet and novelist
March 1 – Robert Hass, American poet
March 13 – Mahmoud Darwish, Palestinian poet
March 21 – Abdulla Oripov, Uzbek poet and statesman
March 22 – Billy Collins, American poet who served two terms as the 44th Poet Laureate of the United States
April 12 – Toi Derricotte, American poet
April 18 – Michael D. Higgins, Irish President, academic and poet
April 29 – Yusef Komunyakaa, American poet, academic and recipient of the 1994 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award and 1995 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry
May 17 – Lyn Hejinian, American poet, essayist, translator and publisher often associated with the Language poets
May 24 – Bob Dylan, American singer-songwriter and recipient of the 2016 Nobel Prize in Literature
May 27 – Simon J. Ortiz, Native American poet and writer associated with the Native American Renaissance
August 4 – Robert Grenier, American poet essayist, and editor often associated with the Language poets
September 1 – Gwendolyn MacEwen, Canadian novelist and poet
September 15 – Lindsay Barrett, Jamaican novelist, poet and journalist
October 2 – John Sinclair, American poet jailed in 1969 after selling two joints to undercover narcotics officers; in 1971 his case receives international attention when John Lennon performs at a benefit concert on his behalf
October 13 – John Snow, English cricketer and poet
October 20 – Stewart Parker, Northern Irish poet and playwright
October 27 – Rodolfo Hinostroza, Peruvian poet, writer, journalist, food critic and astrologer
November 8 – David MacLeod Black, South African-born Scots poet
November 15 – Heathcote Williams, English poet, political activist, film actor and dramatist
November 23 – Derek Mahon, Irish poet
November 29 – Lloyd Schwartz, American poet
December 14 – Rachel Blau DuPlessis, American poet, essayist, critic and academic
December 16 – Poldy Bird, Argentinian poet
date not known:
* Jonathan Holden, American poet and academic
* Jeremy Hooker, English poet, critic, lecturer and broadcaster
* John Mole, English poet
* William Pitt Root, American poet
* Gibbons Ruark, American poet
* Stephen Yenser, American poet

Deaths

Birth years link to the corresponding " in poetry" article:

January 6 – F. R. Higgins, Irish poet
January 13 – James Joyce, 58, Irish novelist and poet
January 23 – John Oxenham, English novelist and poet
February 5 – A. B. (`Banjo') Paterson, Australian bush poet, journalist and author
March 13 – Elizabeth Madox Roberts, American novelist and poet
May 2 – Ibrahim Touqan إبراهيم طوقان, Palestinian, Arab-language poet
May 19 – Lola Ridge, American anarchist poet, editor of avant-garde, feminist and Marxist publications
June 15 – Evelyn Underhill, English poet
August 7 – Rabindranath Tagore, 80, Bengali poet in India, Brahmo Samaj philosopher, visual artist, playwright, composer and novelist whose works reshaped Bengali literature and music in the late 19th and early 20th centuries
August 31 – Marina Tsvetaeva, Soviet Russian poet, suicide by hanging
September 1 – Jiří Orten, Czech poet
c. October? – Alexander Vvedensky, Russian poet
October 1 – Aline Murray Kilmer, American poet and children's writer
October 10 – Timothy Corsellis, English poet, killed in military aircraft accident
October 16 – Sergei Efron, Soviet Russian poet and secret police operative, executed
October 17 – May Ziadeh, Lebanese-Palestinian poet, essayist and translator
November 18 – Émile Nelligan, Canadian French language poet