Elizabeth Jennings
Elizabeth Jennings Poems
- Rembrandt's Late Self-Portrait... You are confronted with ...
Elizabeth Joan Jennings was an English poet.
Life and Career
Elizabeth was born in Boston, Lincolnshire, England in July 18, 1926. Her father was a respected Chief Medical Officer who moved the family to Oxford when she was six years old. She later discovered poetry while attending the Oxford high school.
After attending St Anne's College, Oxford, Elizabeth became a librarian at Oxford city library. Having more time to focus on her writing she published her first collection of poetry (1953) which drew the attention of Robert Conquest. Mr. Conquest would later publish her work with the likes of famous authors Kingsley Amis, Philip Larkin, Thom Gunn and others ... more »
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Quotations
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''For me, poetry is always a search for order.''
Elizabeth Jennings (b. 1926), British poet. As quoted in Contemporary Poets, 3rd ed., by James Vinson (1980).
Comments about Elizabeth Jennings
Rembrandt's Late Self-Portraits
You are confronted with yourself. Each year
The pouches fill, the skin is uglier.
You give it all unflinchingly. You stare
Into yourself, beyond. Your brush's care
Runs with self-knowledge. Here
Is a humility at one with craft.
There is no arrogance. Pride is apart
From this self-scrutiny. You make light drift
The way you want. Your face is bruised and hurt
But there is still love left.
Love of the art and others. To the last
Experiment went on. You stared beyond
Your age, the times. You also plucked the past
And tempered it. Self-portraits ...
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