James Brockway

James Brockway (21 October 1916 – 15 December 2000) was an English poet and translator, who was born in Birmingham and migrated to The Hague, the Netherlands, where he died.

Biography The youngest son of a Birmingham industrialist, By 1940 he had joined the R.A.F. In 1966 he received the Martinus Nijhoff Prize for translation and in 1997 he was knighted by the Dutch government for his services to literature. Kopland in particular was a poet with whose work he had had a special affinity with since the 1980s, and had enjoyed a close working collaboration with him. The prize is awarded for a body of work and the target language changes on a rotating basis. English-language winners have been Francis R. Jones in 2005, Judith Wilkinson in 2013, and David Colmer in 2021. Additionally a Brockway Workshop has also been set up, to run every two years, offering more practical support to international poetry translators.

Selected bibliography

No Summer Song, London, Fortune Press, 1949 (poetry). The Prospect and the River, London, Jackson's Arm, 1987 (translations of Kopland). A World Beyond Myself, London, Enitharmon, 1991 (translations of Kopland). Under the Apple Tree, Leiden, 1994 (translations of Kopland). Anton Korteweg, Amsterdam, 1994 (translations of Korteweg). A Way of Getting Through, Ware, Rockingham Press, 1995 (poetry). Singers Behind Glass, Lincoln, Jackson's Arm, 1995 (translations of eight 20th-century Dutch poets). The Brightness In Between, Ware, Rockingham Press, 2000 (poetry).