Kathleen Jamie

Standard Name: Jamie, Kathleen
Birth Name: Kathleen Jamie
KJ is a contemporary poet who has also published remarkable travel writing and edited poetry anthologies. She feels that her Scots nationality has been an advantage to her, enabling her to write and develop independently of what she calls the metropolitical literary pundits.
Colour photo of Kathleen Jamie holding a copy of her book The Overhaul at the Costa Book Awards in London, 29 January 2013. Standing and shown in profile, she wears a brown-, red-, and grey-patterned dress.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Intertextuality and Influence Alison Fell
The British Council website on contemporary authors sees AF 's poetry as an influence on that of Kathleen Jamie and perhaps Kate Clanchy .
British Council Film and Literature Department, in association with Book Trust. Contemporary Writers in the UK.
Literary responses Selima Hill
SH says she relies on her unconscious for inspiration: It comes together by itself, if you trust it.
Taylor, Debbie. “Deconstructing creativity”. Mslexia, pp. 9 - 13.
9
She says she has been and still is liable to feelings of embarrassment about her work...
Literary responses Sara Maitland
This book was warmly welcomed in The Guardian by Kathleen Jamie , who found it both unique and timely, written with great skill, judgment and good humour.
Jamie, Kathleen. “Noises off”. The Guardian.
Jeanette Winterson picked it as a favourite read...
Reception Jo Shapcott
JS was only the second woman to win the Forward Prize (following Carol Ann Duffy and preceding Kathleen Jamie in 1994).
Crown, Sarah. “Forward Prize goes to Kathleen Jamie”. Guardian Unlimited.
A commentator on the this prize described JS 's work as postfeminist, which...
Textual Features Ruth Padel
RP takes the journey as the most central of all poetic images. The first part of her book is a guide to reading poetry, divided under headings of which many include the words journey,...
Textual Production Ruth Fainlight
Asked about contemporary poets who interest her, RF named two Americans (Gjertrud Schnackenberg and Anne Carson ), and in England (which she was defining rather loosely) Penelope Shuttle and Sarah Maguire , followed by...
Textual Production Antonia Fraser
Its revised edition, 2002, is strong in moderns like Kathleen Jamie and Carol Ann Duffy as well as in the fifteenth century onwards,
Textual Production Carol Rumens
Since this year, 2007, CR has been picking a Poem of the Week for the Guardian newspaper, which prints the poem along with her commentary and analysis. Rumens like to pay attention to context and...

Timeline

26 November 1998
Poems written, read, and discussed by Kathleen Jamie , Jackie Kay , and two male poets were issued as number one in the audio-cassette series Poetry Quartets.
26 September 2009
The Guardian newspaper carried a number of poems and short prose pieces commissioned in support of the 10:10 initiative to reduce carbon emissions.