Ruth Pitter

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Standard Name: Pitter, Ruth
Birth Name: Ruth Pitter
During a career that spanned the greater part of the twentieth century, RP published eighteen collections of poetry. She left letters and a journal, and occasionally spoke or wrote on literary topics. Her admirers have seen her work as offering an alternative to experimental modernism. She has four poems in the Oxford Book of Twentieth-Century English Verse edited by Philip Larkin in 1973.

Connections

Connections Author name Excerpt
Friends, Associates Dorothy Wellesley
Among these readers, Ruth Pitter became a valued friend of DW ,
Wellesley, Dorothy. Far Have I Travelled. James Barrie, 1952.
175
as she did too of Vita Sackville-West . Another friend of Wellesley's later years was Sir Ifor Evans .
Friends, Associates Elizabeth Jennings
She had a remarkably catholic talent for friendship. During her student days she became a friend of Philip Larkin and Kingsley Amis . Her correspondents at this and later periods of her life included her...
Friends, Associates George Orwell
One of those who helped him in a small way financially at his leanest period was the poet Ruth Pitter .
Friends, Associates Alison Uttley
Despite the Blyton fiasco, AU formed friendships with several fellow-writers. She became friends with children's writer Eleanor Farjeon , whom she met in June 1954; poet Ruth Pitter , whom she met in spring 1956...
Friends, Associates Dorothy Wellesley
This friendship led to others for DW , for on Yeats's later visits she invited people to meet him, including Lord David Cecil , Sir William Rothenstein , Rex Whistler , H. A. L. Fisher
Leisure and Society Margaret Kennedy
MK was a guest at a literary dinner honouring Ruth Pitter for winning the Hawthornden prize (for A Trophy of Arms), and Margaret Lane (who had won the Femina Vie Heureuse prize in 1935...
Material Conditions of Writing Margaret Kennedy
Shortly after the publication of Together and Apart, MK attended a literary dinner celebrating Ruth Pitter for her Hawthornden prize. At this dinner, Pitter gave a speech in which (as if reflecting the influence...
Occupation Dorothy Wellesley
At Penns during the Second World WarDW wrote of her fear—An explosion. I thought of my son. (Oh, don't think!) I thought of Hilda (she is safe)—but also of solitude, of her...
Occupation Viola Meynell
Her first broadcast was, appropriately, on her mother, Alice Meynell . The BBC director praised her for being the best first-time presenter he had ever seen. She followed up with programmes on Francis Thompson ,...
Reception Frances Cornford
In this honour she followed Ruth Pitter (the first woman to be awarded the Queen's gold medal) and preceded Stevie Smith .
Reception E. J. Scovell
This volume was a Poetry Book Society recommendation.
Dowson, Jane, editor. Women’s Poetry of the 1930s: A Critical Anthology. Routledge, 1996.
122
Janet Montefiore regrets the absence of EJS from Robin Skelton 's anthology New Verse, 1964, while acknowledging that it would be unfair to blame Skelton...
Textual Features Germaine Greer
Women are a minority here, but well represented: Fleur Adcock , Anna Letitia Barbauld , Amy Clampitt , Olive Custance (Lady Alfred Douglas) , Emily Dickinson , Freda Downie , U. A. Fanthorpe , Vicki Feaver
Textual Production Elizabeth Jennings
In 1990 she supplied the introduction for the Enitharmon Press edition of the Collected Poems of Ruth Pitter (who was to die two years later).
British Library Catalogue. http://explore.bl.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?dscnt=0&tab=local_tab&dstmp=1489778087340&vid=BLVU1&mode=Basic&fromLo, http://explore.bl.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?dscnt=0&tab=local_tab&dstmp=1489778087340&vid=BLVU1&mode=Basic&fromLo.
Textual Production George Orwell
GO began writing during his down-and-out period after his return from British imperial Asia. The poet Ruth Pitter , who read some of his early work in draft, later recalled that we cruel girls...

Timeline

1907
Alfred Richard Orage and Holbrook Jackson acquired the weekly reviewNew Age (founded in 1894).
Kindley, Evan. “Ismism”. London Review of Books, Vol.
36
, No. 2, pp. 33-5.
34
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray, Brian Harrison, and Lawrence Goldman, editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/, http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
under Orage
Solo: Search Oxford University Libraries Online. http://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?vid=OXVU1&fromLogin=true&reset_config=true, http://solo.bodleian.ox.ac.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?vid=OXVU1&fromLogin=true&reset_config=true.
Earlier 1937
Ruth Pitter was awarded the Hawthornden Prize for her poetry; the presentation was made by Vita Sackville-West .

Texts

Pitter, Ruth. A Heaven to Find. Enitharmon Press, 1987.
Pitter, Ruth. A Mad Lady’s Garland. Cresset Press, 1934.
Pitter, Ruth. A Trophy of Arms. Cresset Press, 1936.
Pitter, Ruth, and Elizabeth Jennings. Collected Poems. Enitharmon Press, 1990.
Pitter, Ruth. End of Drought. Barrie and Jenkins, 1975.
Pitter, Ruth. First and Second Poems 1912-1925. Sheed and Ward, 1927.
Pitter, Ruth. First Poems. C. Palmer, 1920.
Pitter, Ruth. On Cats. Cresset Press, 1947.
Pitter, Ruth. Persephone in Hades. A. Sauriac, 1931.
Pitter, Ruth. Poems, 1926-1966. Barrie and Rockliff, 1968.
Pitter, Ruth. Still by Choice. Cresset Press, 1966.
Pitter, Ruth. The Ermine. Cresset Press, 1953.
Pitter, Ruth. The Rude Potato. Cresset Press, 1941.
Pitter, Ruth. Urania. Cresset Press, 1950.