Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature (for instance, Irish or France).
Events January 5 – The Turkish government announces it will posthumously restore the citizenship it had stripped from influential poet Nâzım Hikmet, a Marxist who died in 1963 as an exile in the Soviet Union. January 20 – Poet Elizabeth Alexander reads "Praise Song for the Day" at presidential inauguration of President Barack Obama. February 9 – Eritrean poet and broadcaster Yirgalem Fisseha Mebrahtu is arbitrarily arrested and begins 6 years imprisonment without trial. March 16 – Nicholas Hughes, 47, the son of the poets Ted Hughes (British poet laureate 1984–98) and Sylvia Plath, who famously committed suicide in 1963 when her son was a year old, hangs himself in his home in Alaska. He had suffered from depression. May 1 – Carol Ann Duffy is appointed Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom, the first woman appointed to the position in its 341-year history, a position that has been held by, among others, John Dryden (whom Charles II named the first official poet laureate ), Tennyson, Wordsworth and Cecil Day-Lewis. Duffy is also the first Scot and the first openly gay occupant of the post.Carol Ann Duffy at the Rylands Library in Manchester Friday morning May 5 – Posthumous publication of J. R. R. Tolkien's narrative poem The Legend of Sigurd and Gudrún in alliterative verse based on the 13th century Poetic Edda and probably written in the 1930s. May 16 & May 25 – Ruth Padel becomes the first female ever elected Professor of Poetry at the University of Oxford but resigns nine days later after she is alleged to have been involved in what some sources refer to as a smear campaign against Derek Walcott, her leading rival for the post. June 25 – American pop singer Michael Jackson dies of an acute propofol intoxication at the age of 50. July 30 – Last Post, a poem by Carol Ann Duffy, the Poet Laureate of the United Kingdom, is read on the BBC Radio 4 programme Today. Commissioned by the BBC to mark the deaths of Henry Allingham and Harry Patch, two of the last three surviving British veterans of the World War I, it is read on the day of Allingham's funeral. September 18 – The film Bright Star, about John Keats and his relationship with Fanny Brawne, is released in the United States, and on November 6 in the United Kingdom. The film's title is a reference to a sonnet by Keats, "Bright star, would I were stedfast as thou art", written at the time of the love affair. Jane Campion directed the movie. A Room and a Half, a Russian film directed by Andrey Khrzhanovsky and based on the life of Russian–American poet Joseph Brodsky, is released. It is distributed in the United States in 2010.
Works published in English Listed by nation where the work was first published and again by the poet's native land, if different; substantially revised works listed separately:
Australia Robert Adamson, The Best Australian Poems, Black Inc., , anthology including works by Ivy Alvarez, Judith Beveridge, Sarah K. Bell, Jen Jewel Brown, Anne Elvey, Lisa Gorton, Clive James, Les Murray, Dorothy Porter, Peter Porter, Thomas Shapcott, Alex Skovron, John Tranter, and Chris Wallace-Crabbe.Web page titled "The Best Australian Poems 2009" at the Black Inc. Web site, retrieved February 20, 2011Cordite Poetry Review Stephen Edgar, Other Summers, 109 pp; Melbourne: Black Pepper, Jennifer Harrison and Kate Waterhouse, editors, Motherlode: Australian Women's Poetry 1986 – 2008, 120 poets represented, 342 pp, Glebe, New South Wales: Puncher and Wattmann, , anthology Emma Jones, The Striped World, winner of the 2009 Arts Queensland Judith Wright Calanthe Award; Faber and Faber Martin Langford: editor, Harbour City Poems: Sydney in Verse 1788–2008, Glebe, New South Wales: Puncher and Wattmann, , anthology The Human Project: New and Selected Poems Leonard, John (ed.), The Puncher & Wattmann Anthology of Australian Poetry, Puncher & Wattmann. John Kinsella, The Penguin Anthology of Australian Poetry, Penguin Group (Australia) Les Murray, Killing the Black Dog, Black Inc., Page, Geoff (ed.), 60 Classic Australian Poems (an anthology), University of New South Wales Press. Dorothy Porter, The Bee Hut, Black Inc., Nathan Shepherdson, Apples With Human Skin, St. Lucia, Queensland: University of Queensland Press, Alan Wearne, guest editor, The Best Australian Poetry 2009, University of Queensland Press, Les Wicks The Ambrosiacs (Island Press (Australia)) editor, Guide to Sydney Beaches Meuse Press
Canada Margaret Avison, Listening: The Last Poems, posthumously publishedBritannica (2010), "English: Canada" Robert Bringhurst, Selected Poems Jan Conn, Botero's Beautiful Horses, Brick Books Barry Dempster, Love Outlandish, Brick Books Kate Eichhorn and Heather Milne, editors, Prismatic Publics: Innovative Canadian Women's Poetry and Poetics, Coach House Books, ; an anthology of 15 poets: Nicole Brossard, Margaret Christakos, Susan Holbrook, Dorothy Trujillo Lusk, Karen Mac Cormack, Daphne Marlatt, Erín Moure, M. NourbeSe Philip, Sina Queyras, Lisa Robertson, Gail Scott, Nathalie Stephens, Catriona Strang, Rita Wong, and Rachel Zolf Kim Goldberg, Red Zone, Pig Squash Press Chris Hutchinson, Other People's Lives, Brick Books Adeena Karasick, Amuse Bouche Douglas Lochhead, Looking into Trees Jeanette Lynes, The New Blue Distance Susan Musgrave, When the World Is Not Our Home: Selected Poems, 1985–2000 Soraya Peerbaye, Poems for the Advisory Committee on Antarctic Names Marguerite Pigeon, Inventory Sina Queyras, Expressway, Coach House Books James Reaney, The Essential James Reaney. Brian Bartlett, ed., Porcupine's Quill Laisha Rosnau, Lousy Explorers, Nightwood Editions Stephen Rowe, Never More There, Nightwood Editions Carolyn Smart, Hooked, Brick Books Carmine Starnino, This Way Out, Gaspereau Press Fred Wah, Is a Door David Zieroth, The Fly in Autumn, Harbour Publishing
India, Indian poetry in English Anju Makhija, E V Ramakrishan, editors, We Speak in Changing Languages: Indian Women Poets 1990–2007, anthology, New Delhi: Sahitya AkademiSearch results page, WorldCat website, retrieved August 10, 2010 Anthony Theodore, The Song of My Dance and Dance of My Dreams, Arundhathi Subramaniam, editor, Hot is the Moon: Poems and Stories of Women in Kannada, Tamil, Konkani And Tulu, anthology in various languages, with translations into English; Mumbai: SparrowWeb page titled "Vaidehi" at the Poetry International website; also, Sheth, Priya, "Sparrow Publication presents 'Hot is the Moon'" , February 12, 2009, Mumbai Mirror, both retrieved August 2, 2010 Eunice de Souza, A Necklace of Skulls, Collected Poems ( Poetry in English), New Delhi: PenguinWeb page titled "Eunice de Souza" , Poetry International website, retrieved July 8, 2010 Uddipana Goswami, We Called the River Red ( Poetry in English ), AuthorspressAmbika Ananth, "Ambika Ananth – ‘We Called the river Red’" , book review, Issue 31: May–June 2010, Muse India website, retrieved July 16, 2010 Yash Sharma, Tale of a Virgin River, translated into English by Anil Sehgal from the original Dogri; released with a CD of six songs composed and sung by the poet's daughter, Seema Anil Sehgal, a prominent singer; published in Singapore"Dogri book released in Singapore", August 28, "Tribune News Service", as published at the "J&K Plus" website of The Tribune of Chandigarh, India, retrieved July 6, 2010
Ireland
Michael Coady, Going by Water, Oldcastle, County Meath: Gallery Press Ray Givans, Tolstoy in Love, 82 pages, Kerry Hardie, Only This Room, Oldcastle, County Meath: Gallery Press Ron Houchin, Museum Crows, 84 pages, Cliffs of Moher, County Clare: Salmon Press, Dorothy Molloy, Long-distance Swimmer, 60 pages, Cliffs of Moher, County Clare: Salmon Press, , posthumously published (died 2004) Paul Muldoon, Wayside Shrines, 40 pages, Oldcastle, County Meath: Gallery Press, Eiléan Ní Chuilleanáin, The Sun-fish, Oldcastle, County Meath: Gallery Press Matthew Sweeney, Best of Irish Poetry 2010, Southword Editions, including work by Seamus Heaney, Michael Longley, Paul Muldoon, Michael McKimm, Leanne O'Sullivan, Leontia Flynn, Eva Bourke and Kerry Hardie Peggy O'Brien, Frog Spotting, 87 pages, Dedalus Press, Stephen Roger Powers, The Follower's Tale, 100 pages, Cliffs of Moher, County Clare: Salmon Press, Gabriel Rosenstock, Uttering Her Name, 126 pages, Cliffs of Moher, County Clare: Salmon Press, A.E. Stringer, Human Costume, 100 pages, Cliffs of Moher, County Clare: Salmon Press, Enda Wyley, To Wake to This, Dedalus Press,
New Zealand Stephanie de Montalk, Vivid Familiar, Victoria University Press Jessica Le Bas Walking to Africa, Auckland University Press Tusiata Avia, Bloodclot, Victoria University Press
Poets in Best New Zealand Poems Poems from these 25 poets were selected by James Brown for Best New Zealand Poems 2008, published online this year:
Johanna Aitchison Hinemoana Baker Emma Barnes David Beach Peter Bland
Jenny Bornholdt Amy Brown Cliff Fell Joan Fleming Bernadette Hall
Sam Hunt Lynn Jenner Michele Leggott Jean McCormack Emma Neale
Gregory O'Brien Bob Orr Chris Orsman Richard Reeve Sam Sampson
Kerrin P. Sharpe Tim Upperton Richard von Sturmer Tom Weston Sonja Yelich
United Kingdom
James Byrne, Blood/Sugar, Caroline Grigson, editor, The Life and Poems of Anne Hunter: Haydn's Tuneful Voice (Hunter, 1742–1821, wrote lyrics to much of Haydn's music) Liverpool University Press (Liverpool English Texts and Studies) Brian Henry, Quarantine::Contagion, Luke Kennard, The Migraine Hotel, Salt, 96 pages, Herbert Lomas, A Casual Knack of Living: Collected Poems, contains all nine of the author's previous poetry books and one previously unpublished book of poems; 428 pages, Sean O'Brien, Night Train (with artist Birtley Aris), Flambard Press Ruth Padel, Darwin: A Life in Poems, the author is his great-granddaughterBritannica (2010) "English: United Kingdom" Christopher Reid, A Scattering (2009 Costa Book Awards book of the year) Matthew Welton, We needed coffee but..., 96 pages, Carcanet Press,
Anthologies in the United Kingdom Gerard Carruthers, editor, Scottish Poems Fiona Sampson, editor, A Century of Poetry Review, Carcanet Press,
Criticism, scholarship and biography in the United Kingdom Zachary Leader, editor, The Movement Reconsidered: Essays on Larkin, Amis, Gunn, and Their Contemporaries, Oxford University Press (April 2009)Web page titled "20th and 21st Century" , Oxford University Press website, retrieved December 10, 2008 Contemporary Poetry: Poets and Poetry since 1990 (Cambridge Contexts in Literature) Cambridge University Press, 1st edition
United States
Sherman Alexie, Face, the author's first collection in nine years, Hanging Loose Press (April)Web page titled "Spring 2009 Hardcovers: Poetry" at Publishers Weekly website, retrieved March 12, 2009 Miguel Algarín, Survival Supervivencia, essays and poemsBritannica (2010), "English: United States" Simone dos Anjos, Comedies, Iowa City, Iowa: Cosa Nostra Editions Philip Appleman, Karma, Dharma, Pudding & Pie Quantuck Lane Press (April) Rae Armantrout, Versed, winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award for Poetry and the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Poetry; Wesleyan University Press Renée Ashley, Basic Heart Anny Ballardini, Ghost Dance in 33 Movements Otoliths, Richard Bauch, These Extremes David Biespiel, The Book of Men and Women Jules Boykoff, Hegemonic Love Potion, Factory School, Brooklyn, New York Joel Brouwer, And So, Four Way, Web page titled "Fiction Book Reviews", dated March 16, 2009, at Publishers Weekly website, retrieved March 24, 2009 Louis Cabri, that can’t, Nomados, Vancouver Gabrielle Calvocoressi, Apocalyptic Swing (August), Persea C. P. Cavafy, translated from the Greek by Daniel Mendelsohn: Collected Poems, Knopf,