John Kinsella

Australian John Kinsella has written over 20 books of poetry, as well as plays and fiction; he also maintains an active literary career as a teacher and editor. Kinsella’s poetry is both experimental and pastoral, featuring the landscape of Western Australia. Paul Kane observed in World Literature Today, “In Kinsella’s poetry these are lands marked by isolation and mundane violence and by a terrible transcendent beauty.” His The New Arcadia (2007) is a book-length exploration of Western Australia’s timeless and timeworn landscape; the book is informed by the history of the country and the bucolic poetic tradition. Kinsella’s recent books of poetry include Firebreaks (2016), Drowning in Wheat: Selected Poems (2016), and Insomnia (2019).

In his “Alternative Biography,” Kinsella describes himself as “a supporter of worldwide indigenous rights, and an absolute supporter of land rights.” He has been a “vegan anarchist pacifist” for 33 years. 

Kinsella has received many awards for his poetry, including the Western Australian Premier’s Book Award and the John Bray Award for Poetry from the Adelaide Festival; he has won fellowships from the Literature Board of the Australia Council.

Kinsella has taught at universities in Australia and at Kenyon College in the United States. Founding editor of the journal Salt in Australia, he serves as international editor at the Kenyon Review. His interviews with other writers and selections of his poetry can be found on his website.