Kris Alan Hemensley (born 26 April 1946) is an
English-
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...
n
poet
A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator (thought, thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral t ...
who has published around 20 collections of poetry. Through the late 1960s and '70s he was involved in poetry workshops at
La Mama, and edited the literary magazines ''
Our Glass'', ''
The Ear in a Wheatfield,'' and others. ''The Ear'' played an important role in providing a place where poets writing outside what was then the mainstream (such as
Jennifer Maiden) could publish their work. In 1969 and 1970 he presented the program ''Kris Hemensley's Melbourne'' on
ABC Radio. In the 1970s he was poetry editor for ''
Meanjin
''Meanjin'' (), formerly ''Meanjin Papers'' and ''Meanjin Quarterly'', is one of Australia's longest-running literary magazines. Established in 1940 in Brisbane, it moved to Melbourne in 1945 and as of 2008 is an editorially independent impri ...
''
The son of an
Egypt
Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...
ian mother and an
English father who was stationed in Egypt with the
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force (RAF) is the Air force, air and space force of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories and Crown Dependencies. It was formed towards the end of the World War I, First World War on 1 April 1918, on the merger of t ...
, Hemensley was born on the
Isle of Wight
The Isle of Wight (Help:IPA/English, /waɪt/ Help:Pronunciation respelling key, ''WYTE'') is an island off the south coast of England which, together with its surrounding uninhabited islets and Skerry, skerries, is also a ceremonial county. T ...
, and spent his early childhood in
Alexandria
Alexandria ( ; ) is the List of cities and towns in Egypt#Largest cities, second largest city in Egypt and the List of coastal settlements of the Mediterranean Sea, largest city on the Mediterranean coast. It lies at the western edge of the Nile ...
. He visited
Australia
Australia, officially the Commonwealth of Australia, is a country comprising mainland Australia, the mainland of the Australia (continent), Australian continent, the island of Tasmania and list of islands of Australia, numerous smaller isl ...
at the age of 18, and emigrated there in 1966. He was awarded the
Christopher Brennan Award in 2005, which recognizes poetry of "sustained quality and distinction".
Hemensley managed Collected Works, a specialist poetry bookshop in
Melbourne, Australia
Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung/ or ) is the capital and most populous city of the Australian state of Victoria, and the second most-populous city in Australia, after Sydney. The city's name generally refers to a metropolitan area also known ...
, until it closed down in late 2018.
Poetry collections
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Further reading
* Martin Duwell, ‘Kris Hemensley,’ in A Possible Contemporary Poetry: Interviews with Thirteen Poets from the New Australian Poetry (St Lucia, Qld: Makar Press, 1982), pp. 50–66.
* Carl Harrison-Ford, ‘Poetics before Politics: A Note on Kris Hemensley’s "New Australian Poetry",’ Meanjin Quarterly 29.2 (1970), pp. 226–31.
* Kris Hemensley, ‘First Look at "The New Australian Poetry",’ Meanjin Quarterly 29.1 (1970), pp. 118–21.
* Kris Hemensley, Introduction, The Best of the Ear: The Ear in a Wheatfield, 1973–1976: A Portrait of a Magazine (Clifton Hill, Vic: Rigmorale Books, 1985).
* Kris Hemensley, ‘ "…The Wild Assertion of Vitality" ’ Australian Literary Studies 8.2 (1977), pp. 226–39.
* Marcus O’Donnell, ‘Kris Hemensley: Reflections on Three Generations,’ The Small Press Times (1992), p. 1.
* Ken Taylor, ‘Kris Hemensley’s Melbourne,’ Melbourne On My Mind (Melbourne: ABC, 1976), pp. 49–63.
* Jim Tulip, ‘Towards an Australian Modernism: New Writings of Kris Hemensley,’ Southerly 37.2 (1977), pp. 142–51.
Notes
External links
Newspaper article on Hemensley and the Christopher Brennan AwardAustralian Literary Resources bio pageAust Lit entry*
Australian Poetry Library - Kris Hemensley
{{DEFAULTSORT:Hemensley, Kris
Living people
1946 births
Australian poets
English emigrants to Australia
Writers from Melbourne
People from the Isle of Wight
Writers from Alexandria
Australian people of English descent
Australian people of Egyptian descent