Masefield, John

Masefield, John (1878-1967), British author and Poet Laureate, who helped break down Victorian conventions in English poetry. Born on June 1, 1878, in Ledbury, at the age of 15 Masefield went to sea, then lived and worked in New York for a time. After returning to England in 1897, he contributed poems, stories, and articles to periodicals, and in 1900 he joined the staff of the Manchester Guardian. His first book of verse, Salt-Water Ballads (1902), containing his most famous poem, “Sea Fever”, established his reputation as a poet of the sea. He achieved fame in 1911 with a forceful, realistic narrative poem, The Everlasting Mercy, about the redemption of a rural libertine. In the same vein were The Widow in the Bye Street (1912), Dauber (1913), and Reynard the Fox (1919).

Among Masefield's numerous other works are the plays The Tragedy of Nan (1909) and The Tragedy of Pompey the Great (1910); the novels Multitude and Solitude (1909) and Sard Harker (1924); and the autobiographies In the Mill (1941) and So Long to Learn (1952). Masefield was essentially a narrative poet; his best poems are marked by a vigorous, direct style and a gift for realistic observation. In 1930 he was named Poet Laureate, and in 1935 he was made a member of the Order of Merit. He died on May 12, 1967, near Abingdon.