Dr Peter Anderson

Associate Professor

Biography

Peter Anderson was educated at UCT and Oxford. He worked as a teacher and publisher before returning to academia in 1997. He has published four volumes, Litany Bird, Foundling's Island, a long poem In a Free State: A Music (“Destined to be a landmark in South African poetry” – J.M. Coetzee), and Night Transit (Dryad). He is the recipient of South Africa’s Thomas Pringle Prize for Poetry (2018) and the Sanlam Literary Award (2006). His work has appeared in The London Magazine, Denver Quarterly, TEXT, The Rialto, New Contrast, New Coin, Stanzas, The Hopkins Review, Blue Earth Revue, Rougarou, Tears in the Fence, and other magazines.

Publications

Monographs

(volumes of poetry)

Night Transit, Dryad Press, 2023. ISBN 978-1-991209-15-3

In a Free State, uHlanga, 2018. ISBN 9780620812245

Foundling’s Island, ElectricBookWorks/UCT Writer’s Series, 2007. ISBN 9781920218034

2^nd edition, uHlanga, 2018. ISBN 9780620812252

Litany Bird, Carapace Poets, Cape Town, 2000. ISBN 1874923515

Edited Volumes

(poetry anthology)

In the Country of the Heart, (ed.) Jacana, Johannesburg, 2004. ISBN 1919931562

Peer-reviewed articles

‘“What Exile Ever Fled his Own Mind?” On Reading Horace in South Africa and Italy’, English in Africa, 49(3), 2022, ISSN 0376-8902 (accredited).

“Earmarks: Fragments from the Notebooks”, TEXT, Special Issue No. 46, 2017. (peer reviewed) http://www.textjournal.com.au

“A beehive of glances: Valerio Magrelli, the translation of poetry and the poetry of translation”, Italian Studies in South Africa, 29 (2), 2016, ISSN 2225-7039 (accredited)

“Collecting Darkness, Scattering Light: The Poetry and Presence of Don Maclennan”, English in Africa, 43 (1), 2016, pp. 131-147. ISSN 0376-8902 (accredited)

“On Photographs at War: Images of the South African 6^th Armored Division in Italy 1944-1955”, Safundi: Journal of South African and American Studies, 15 (2-3), 2014, Routledge, pp. 197-225. ISSN 1753-3171 (accredited)

“This Late Place: Stephen Watson, Poet, Essayist, Critic and Scholar”, English in Africa, Vol. 39, No. 1, May 2012, pp. 9-20. ISSN 0376-8902 (accredited)

“’Never luff to meddle mit politics, sir’: Errant Satire and Historical Gainsaying in A. G. Bain’s ‘Kaatje Kakkelbek, or, Life among the Hottentots’”, Journal of Southern African Studies, Vol. 38, no. 1, March 2012, pp. 217-232. ISSN 0305-7070 (print), 1465-3893 (online) (accredited)

“’Thickening, deepening, blackening’: Starlings and the Object of Poetry in Coleridge and Dante”, The Coleridge Bulletin, NS 32, Winter 2008, pp. 55-62. ISSN (peer reviewed)

“Overhearing the Hail: a Poetics of Weather”, English Academy Review, 25 (2) 2008, pp. 53–64 ISSN 1013-1752 (accredited)

“Home Truths: Samuel Taylor Coleridge Advises Thomas Pringle”, The Coleridge Bulletin, New Series 28, Winter 2006, pp. 21–8, ISSN (peer reviewed)

“The Fish River Bush and the Place of History”, South African Historical Journal, 53, 2005, pp. 23–49. ISSN 0258-2473 (accredited)

“Museu da Revoluçao”, New Contrast, 127, 2004. pp. 44–60. ISSN 1017-5415. (accredited)

Chapters in books

“Over the Freeway”, At the Foot of the Volcano: Reflections on Teaching at a South African University, ed. Susan Levine, HSRC Press (2019) ISBN-13: 978-1928246190

“Satchel”, Object Relations, ed. Stephen Inggs, Michaelis School of Fine Art, pp. 82-3. ISBN 978-0-620-63500-4

“On Common Ground”, A City Imagined: Cape Town and the Meanings of a Place, ed. S. Watson, Penguin (2006) ISBN 0-143-02473-6

“A Murmuration of Starlings: On an Image in Dante and Others”, Dante in South Africa, ed. P. Cullinan and S. Watson, Centre for Creative Writing, UCT, 2005, pp. 45–54. ISBN 0620355492 (peer reviewed)

Catalogues

“Photosynthesis”, Virginia MacKenny: At Sand’s Edge, pp.13-24. Barnard Gallery, 2018.

Poetry in anthologies and journals

(since 1997)

“Comet, Cape Town”, Tears in the Fence (78) 2023, pp 44-5. ISSN 0266-5816

“Vocation”, “The Letters”, New Contrast (200) 2023, ISSN 1017-5415.

“Sea Change”, Rougarou: Journal of Arts and Literature (Spring 2022), rougarou.org

“The Life Unled”, Blue Earth Review (27), 2021, Minnesota State University, pp. 6-7. ISSN 1548-4009.

“To the West”, Stilet 32 (1&2) (May/September 2020), p. 182. ISSN: 1013-4573.

“Insects”, The Rialto, 94 (Summer 2020), Norwich, UK, p. 55. ISSN 0268-5981.

“Seventeen Depositions on Two Mechanical Breakdowns, Sekhukhuneland 1986”, Denver Quarterly, 54 (1), 2020, Denver, Colorado, pp 1-3. ISSN 0011-8869

“On Arrival”, “Goldfinches”, “Out of the Wind”, TEXT, Special Issue No. 46. 2017. http://www.textjournal.com.au

“A Short Walk in the Zuurveld”, “A Full Confession”, “Take Art (Burning the Pictures)”, New Contrast, 45 (179), 2017, ISSN 1017 – 5415.

“Heinz Guderian at Yasnaya Polyana” (runner-up, Vice-Chancellor’s International Poetry Prize, University of Canberra), Tremble, eds. Nilofaar Fanaiyan and Monica Carrol, International Poetry Studies Institute, 2016, pp. 6-7, ISBN 978-1-74088-448-8

“Under the Loquat”, “The Goldfinches of Rome”, The London Magazine Online, May-June 2018,

https://www.thelondonmagazine.org/the-goldfinches-of-rome-peter-anderson/

https://www.thelondonmagazine.org/under-the-loquat-peter-anderson/

“Dirty Linen”, translated from the Italian of Mara Boccaccio, Prufrock 3 (2), 2017, p. 23. ISSN 2308-1937

“Skies”, “Mercurial Day”, “Umnyele”, Stanzas, 7, 2017, pp. 20-3. ISSN 2412-6985-07

“First Light”, New Contrast, 44 (174), 2016, pp. 18-19, ISSN 1017-5415

“Night Transit, c. 1989”, New Coin, 52 (2), 2016, pp. 60-1, ISSN 0028-4459

“Churchhaven”, Voices of This Land, Van Schaik, 2013, pp. 118-9. ISBN 978 0 627 03066 6

“The Birds at White River”, Birds in Words, ed. G. Ferguson and T. Morphet, UMUZI, 2006, p. 3. ISBN 1415200246

“St Peter’s Churchyard”, Leaves to a Tree, ed. R. Malan, David Philip, 2005, pp. 16–18. ISBN 0864866836.

“The Passing World”, “The Telling of It”, “The People of Demeter”, New Contrast, 128. 2004. pp. 72– 8. ISSN 1017-5415.

“Vondelingseiland”, “St Peter’s Churchyard”, “Gone Fishing”, “Notes on a Visit to the Grave of Nonqgawuse”, New Contrast, 123, 2003. pp. 3– 9. ISSN 1017-5415.

“Churchhaven”, “Oysters”, “Map Reading”, A New Century of South African Poetry, Ad. Donker, M. Chapman (ed.), 2002. ISBN 0868522244. (and subsequent editions)

“Milnerton Beach”, City in Words (eds De Kok and Ferguson), David Philip Publishers, 2001. pp. 12-13. ISBN 0 86486 380 2

“Churchhaven”, “Dream”, “Lullaby”, New Contrast, 109, 2000, pp. 6–9. ISSN1017-5415.

“Sleeping Outside”, “Jacob’s Ladder”, Carapace, 49, p. 8.

“Passage”, Carapace, 46, pp. 8–9.

“The Voyage In”, “Shiloh”, New Coin, 35, 1999, pp. 5–6. ISSN 0028-4459.

“The Birds at White River”, “Roads”, “Arrival”, New Coin, 34, 1998. ISSN 0028-4459.

“Love Song in Red Welsh”, “The Ballad of Bad Faith”, New Contrast, 104, 1998, pp. 57–9. ISSN 1017-5415.

“The Firewatch”, “Christmas 1997”, New Contrast, 102, 1998, pp. 42–4. ISSN 1017-5415

Literary Prizes

SANLAM Literary Award, 2003

The Vice-Chancellor’s Poetry Prize, Canberra University, Runner Up: “Heinz Guderian at Yasnaya Polyana”, 2016.

The Thomas Pringle Prize for Poetry, “First Light”, 2018. South Africa’s premier award for a single poem published within a period of three years.

The Rialto/RSPB Nature and Place Prize, Runner Up: “Insects”, 2020 (as a reflection on the arduous peer-review implicit in winning an international prize, this most recent award was made from among over 3500 poems from more than 20 countries).

Reviews

Reviews and review articles in SA Outlook, 1991– 2, Kronos (2005), The Sunday Independent (2005 –9, LitNet (2005–7), English Academy Review (2009 –), South African Journal of Science (2010–)

Broadcasts

“’Kubla Khan’: A Vision in a Dream”, “The Forum”, BBC World Service, 13 – 17 January 2018. (www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/w3csvsfl)

“Unintended Consequences” (on Coleridge, the Xhosa wardoctor Makhanda, and Mandela), “The Forum”, BBC World Service, 9 December 2014. (http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p02d5qfp)

30+ programmes of “Word of Mouth”, SAfm, 2005–10