Craig Raine
Craig Anthony Raine,
Early life
Raine was born in Bishop Auckland, County Durham, the son of Norman Edward and Olive Marie Raine. accountants or surgeons or something. I couldn't say my father was an ex-boxer who did faith healing, had epileptic fits and lived off a pension. So for a while I said he was a football manager. But by the end I was inviting my friends home and they thought he was just as terrific as I did.[6]
Raine has commented on his education: "At Barnard Castle I was taught by an absolutely remarkable English teacher, Arnold Snodgrass, a friend of W. H. Auden at Oxford [and later Robert Graves]. There was no question that he altered my mindset on things and made me very critical."[4][7] At school he wrote "'pimply Dylan Thomas' poems, some of which he sent to Philip Toynbee, then lead reviewer at The Observer".[6]
Raine received his university education at
Career
He taught at Oxford and followed a literary career as book editor for New Review, editor of Quarto, and poetry editor at the
In 1972 he married Ann Pasternak Slater, a now retired fellow of St Anne's College, Oxford.[2] They have one daughter and three sons. Moses Raine is a playwright and Nina Raine a director and playwright.[2]
Craig Raine is founder and editor of the literary magazine Areté and a frequent contributor.[8] His works include a number of poetry collections:[9] The Onion, Memory (1978), A Martian Sends a Postcard Home (1979), A Free Translation (1981), Rich (1984), History: The Home Movie (1994), and Clay. Whereabouts Unknown (1996). His reviews and essays are collected in two anthologies: Haydn and the Valve Trumpet (1990) and In Defence of T. S. Eliot (2000). A short critical-biographical study of Eliot, T. S. Eliot: Image, Text and Context, was published in 2007.
His friend Ian McEwan argues that Raine espouses "very strong and clear, almost Arnoldian, ideas of literature and criticism".[6]
Books
Poetry collections
- The Onion, Memory, ISBN 0-19-211877-3.
- A Journey to Greece, Sycamore Press, 1979
- A Martian Sends a Postcard Home, Oxford University Press, 1979. ISBN 0-19-211896-X.
- A Free Translation, Salamander, 1981
- Rich, Faber and Faber, 1984
- The Prophetic Book (bilingual edition with Polish translation by Jerzy Jarniewicz), Correspondance des Arts, 1989
- History: The Home Movie, Penguin, 1994
- Change, Prospero Poets, 1995
- Clay: Whereabouts Unknown, Penguin, 1996
- Collected Poems 1978–1999, Picador, 1999
- A la recherche du temps perdu, Picador, 2000
- How Snow Falls, 2010
Fiction
- Heartbreak, Atlantic, 2010
- The Divine Comedy, Atlantic, 2012
Drama
- 1953: A Version of Racine's Andromaque, Faber and Faber, 1990
Libretto
- The Electrification of the Soviet Union, Faber and Faber, 1986, opera by Nigel Osborne
Criticism
- Haydn and the Valve Trumpet, Faber and Faber, 1990
- In Defence of T. S. Eliot, Picador, 2000
- T. S. Eliot: Image, Text and Context, Oxford University Press, 2007
- More Dynamite: Essays 1990–2012, Atlantic, 2013
- My Grandmother's Glass Eye: A Look at Poetry, Atlantic, 2016
As editor
- A Choice of Kipling's Prose, Faber and Faber, 1987
- Rudyard Kipling: Selected Poems, Penguin, 1992
- New Writing 7, (co-editor) Vintage, 1998
References
- ^ British Council: Biography Archived 16 December 2010 at the Wayback Machine – "It is worth recalling how The Onion, Memory (1978) and A Martian Sends a Postcard Home (1979), Raine’s first two poetry collections, made such a spectacular impact on the then becalmed world of British poetry, seeming to set off a stylistic revolution of visual similes, wordplay and punning – even if in the long run it turned out to be a fashion. 'The Martian School', so-called by his friend James Fenton and inaugurated with another, Christopher Reid, had a widespread effect on readers and young poets alike, spawning a host of imitators."
- ^ a b c 'RAINE, Craig Anthony', Who's Who 2012, A & C Black, 2012; online edn, Oxford University Press, Dec 2011 ; online edn, Nov 2011 accessed 20 April 2012
- ^ a b c "Ex-boxer fined £100 on liquor charges". Newcastle Journal. 6 January 1945.
- ^ a b FATE PLAYS AN ELECTRIFYING HAND, The Northern Echo, 28 October 2002
- ^ Interview: Craig Raine, author – News – Scotsman.com
- ^ a b c d e f A life in writing | Books | The Guardian
- ^ "Archived copy". Archived from the original on 4 January 2012. Retrieved 9 November 2011.
{{cite web}}
: CS1 maint: archived copy as title (link) - ^ a b British Council: Biography Archived 16 December 2010 at the Wayback Machine
- ^ Nielsen BookData at 27 November 2008
External links
- British Council profile
- Portraits at the National Portrait Gallery
- "Bad Language: Poetry, Swearing and Translation" article by Craig Raine in Thumbscrew magazine, No 1 – Winter 1994-5
- "A life in writing", interview by Nicholas Wroe, The Guardian (17 October 2009)
- "The Books Interview: Craig Raine" The New Statesman 5 July 2010
- 'Heartache in his Head'[usurped], review of How Snow Falls in The Oxonian Review