Nationality words link to articles with information on the nation's poetry or literature (for instance, Irish or France).
March 4 — Pablo Neruda elected a Communist party senator in Chile. He officially joins the Communist Party of Chile four months later.
April — Ilona Karmel and Henia Karmel, sisters from the Kraków Ghetto and together Polish Jewish prisoners of the Nazis, are on a forced death march when Germans in tanks crush them and then shove them, still living, into a mass grave. Soon after, a group of prisoners passes them, including a cousin of theirs. From their hiding place in her clothes, Henia Karmel rips out some poems she and her sister had written and hands them to her cousin to give to her husband, Leon, back in Kraków. The cousin delivers the poems, and the sisters are saved by a nearby farmer who takes them to a hospital. Henia writes in 1947, "these poems are real, not just scribblings.[they] came about when I was still creating myself, experiencing the pain of separation. How I could have survived, you might ask? If so, sir, you know nothing of life. It lasted, that's all." Henia writes in her poem, "Snapshots": "My name is Number 906. / And guess what? I still write verse."
April 2 — British aircraft carrier HMS Glory (built in Belfast) is commissioned and sails for the Pacific theatre of war; Cornish poet Charles Causley is serving as a Chief Petty Officer Coder on this voyage.
May — Estonian poet Heiti Talvik is deported to Siberia and never heard from again.
May 2 — Ezra Pound is arrested by Italian partisans, and taken (according to Hugh Kenner) "to their HQ in Chiavari, where he was soon released as possessing no interest". On May 5, he turns himself in to U.S. forces. He is incarcerated in a United States Army detention camp outside Pisa, spending 25 days in an open cage before being given a tent. Here he appears to have suffered a nervous breakdown. While in the camp he drafts the Pisan Cantos, a section of the work in progress which marks a shift in Pound's work, being a meditation on his own and Europe's ruin and on his place in the natural world. The Pisan Cantos wins the first Bollingen Prize from the Library of Congress in 1948.
June — Australia's most celebrated literary hoax takes place when Angry Penguins is published with poems by the fictional Ern Malley. Poets James McAuley and Harold Stewart created the poems from lines of other published work and then sent them as the purported work of a recently deceased poet. The hoax is played on Max Harris, at this time a 22-year-old avant garde poet and critic who had started the modernist magazine, Angry Penguins. Harris and his circle of literary friends agreed that a hitherto completely unknown modernist poet of great merit had come to light in suburban Australia. The Autumn 1944 edition of the magazine with the poems comes out in mid-1945 due to wartime printing delays. An Australian newspaper uncovers the hoax within weeks. McAuley and Stewart loved early Modernist poets but despise later modernism and especially the well-funded Angry Penguins and are jealous of Harris's precocious success.
June 7 — Benjamin Britten's opera Peter Grimes, based on George Crabbe's The Borough, is first performed.
Two small Canadian literary magazines, Preview and First Statement (each founded separately in 1942) combine to form Northern Review (which lasts until 1956).
Kyk-over-al magazine founded in Guyana.
Vladimir Nabokov becomes a naturalized citizen of the United States.
Listed by nation where the work was first published and again by the poet's native land, if different; substantially revised works listed separately:
Earle Birney, Now Is Time. Toronto: Ryerson Press. Governor General's Award 1945.
Arthur Bourinot, True Harvest.
Irving Layton, Here and Now
Anne Marriott, Sandstone and Other Poems, Toronto: Ryerson Press.
E. J. Pratt, They Are Returning, Toronto: Macmillan.
F. R. Scott. Overture. Toronto: Ryerson Press.
Elizabeth Smart, "By Grand Central Station I Sat Down and Wept" (prose poem)
Raymond Souster, When We Are Young. Montreal: First Statement.
Miriam Waddington, Green World
Serapia Devi, The Book of Beneficent Grief and Other Poems ( Poetry in English ), Lahore: R. S. Ram Jawaya Kapur
B. Rajan, Monsoon ( Poetry in English ),
Subho Tagore, May Day and Other Poems ( Poetry in English ), Calcutta: Book Emporium
V.N. Bhushan, editor, The Peacock Lute: An Anthology of Poems in English by Indian Writers, Bombay: Padma Pub., 155 pages
W. H. Auden, English poet living in the United States
Collected Poems
For the Time Being
John Betjeman, New Bats in Old Belfries
R. N. Currey, This Other Planet
Walter de la Mare, The Burning-Glass, and Other Poems
W. S. Graham, Second Poems
Michael Hamburger, Later Hogarth
A. P. Herbert, Light the Lights
sidney Keyes, Collected Poems, posthumous
Philip Larkin, The North Ship, London: Dent
Alun Lewis, Ha! Ha! Among the Trumpets, foreword by Robert Graves; posthumously published
Ruth Pitter, The Bridge
William Plomer, The Dorking Thigh, and Other Satires
F. T. Prince, Soldiers Bathing, and Other Poems
Henry Treece, The Black Seasons
Vernon Watkins, The Lamp and the Veil
W. H. Auden, The Collected Poetry, English poet living in the United States
John Malcolm Brinnin, No Arch, No Triumph
Gwendolyn Brooks, A Street in Bronzeville
Emily Dickinson, Bolts of Melody, published posthumously
H.D. (Hilda Doolittle), "Tribute to the Angels", second part of Trilogy (1944–46) about the experience of the Blitz in wartime London
Randall Jarrell, Little Friend, Little Friend, including "The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner", New York: Dial Press
William Ellery Leonard, A Man Against Time, published posthumously
Ogden Nash, Many Long Years Ago
John Crowe Ransom, Selected Poems
Karl Shapiro, Essay on Rime
Wallace Stevens, Esthetique du Mal, Cummington Press
George Campbell (poet), First Poems, Caribbean
Allen Curnow, editor, A Book of New Zealand Verse 1923–45 (Caxton), New Zealander
Denis Glover, The Wind and the Sand, New Zealander
Kenneth Slessor, Australian Poetry, anthology, Australia
Louis Aragon:
La Diane française
Le Nouveau Crevecoeur, about the Resistance
René Char, Seuls demeurent
Paul Claudel, Visages radieux
Max Jacob, Derniers Poemès, published posthumously (died 1944)
Pierre Jean Jouve:
Trois Poèmes aux Démons, Porrentruy: Portes de France
La Vierge de Paris
Henri Michaux, Épreuves, exorcismes
Saint-John Perse, Exil, suivi de Poème à l'étrangère; Pluies; Neiges Paris: Gallimard (a republication of Quatre poèmes, 1941-1944, Buenos Aires: Les Editions Lettres Françaises 1944), France
Jacques Prévert, Spectacles
Pierre Reverdy, Plupart du temps: poèmes 1915–1922
Georges Schéhadé, Chants d'ombre
Including all of the British colonies that later became India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal. Listed alphabetically by first name, regardless of surname:
Abdul Ahad Azad, Daryav, the author's magnum opus, on the theme of political revolution
Mahjoor:
Kalam-e Mahjoor (No. 9), lyrics on love
Payem-e Mahjoor (No. 2 and No. 3), in the Devanagari script; on social and national themes
G. Sankara Kurup, Nimisam
Pappukkutti Kotamangalam, Katattuvanci, one of the first poetry books of the progressive movement in Malayalam literature
V. A. Anandakkuttan, Aradhana
Desikavinayagam Pillai, translator, Umarkayyam Patalkar, translation into Tamil of Edward Fitzgerald's English translation of Omar Khayyam's Rubaiyat
Devakanta Barua, Sagar dekhisa ; Assamese-language
Devarakonda Balagangadhara Tilak, Prabhatamu-Sandhya; Telugu-language
Dinu Bhai Pant, Guttalum, seven poems, including two lengthy ones, Dogri
E. V. R. Namputiri, translator, Mahakavih Krtyah, translation into Sanskrit from the Malayalam poems of Ulloor
Firak, Urdu Ki 'ishqiyah sha'iri, a major Urdu poet's literary criticism in Urdu on the idea of love as expressed in that language's poetry
Gopal Prasad Rimal, Masan ("The Crematorium"); Nepali-language
Gurnam Singh Tir, Hasdi Dunia; Punjabi
Laxmi Prasad Devkota, Sakuntal, the first epic poem in the Nepali language, 24 cantos in Sanskrit Varnik meters, and the diction is very "Sanskritized"
P. V. Krishnan Nair, translator, Madirotsava, translation into Sanskrit of Edward Fitzgerald's English translation of Omar Khayyam's Rubaiyat
Trilochan, Dharti, Hindi-language pragativadi poems largely on man's struggles and life's contraditions
V. R. M. Chettiyar, translator, Kitancali, translation into Tamil from the Indian poetry in English of Rabindranath Tagore's Gitanjali
Mario Benedetti, La víspera indeleble ("Indelible Eve"), his first published book, Uruguay
Eugenio Montale, Finisterre, a chapbook of poetry; second edition; Florence: Barbèra (first edition published in 1943 after a manuscript was smuggled into Switzerland ); Italy
Leopoldo Panero, Versos del Guadarrama ("Verses of Guadarrama"); Spain
Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress (later the post would be called "Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress"): Louise Bogan appointed this year. She would serve until sometime in 1946.
Pulitzer Prize for poetry: Karl Shapiro, V-Letter and Other Poems
Governor General's Award, poetry or drama: Now is Time, Earle Birney (Canada)
Death years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
February 2 – Yoshihiko Funazaki 舟崎 克彦, Japanese novelist, poet, illustrator, manga writer, songwriter and academic (surname: Funazaki)
February 10 – Clive Wilmer, English poet and academic
February 23 – Robert Gray, Australian
March 7 – Ira Sadoff, American poet and academic
April 2 – Anne Waldman, American
April 10 – Norman Dubie, American
April 18 – Dick Davis, English-born poet and translator
April 30 – Annie Dillard, American poet and 1975 Pulitzer Prize winner
June 7 – Falguni Ray (died 1981), Bengali poet and youngest member of Hungryalism movement
June 21 – Adam Zagajewski, Polish poet, novelist, and essayist
July 7 – Natsuki Ikezawa (池澤夏樹), Japanese novelist, essayist, translator and poet who stops publishing poetry in 1982
July 12 – Remy Sylado (Yapi Panda Abdiel Tambayong), Indonesian writer
July 21 – Wendy Cope, English
August 13 – Tom Wayman, Canadian poet and academic
August 28 – Marianne Bluger (died 2005), Canadian
August 29 – Galit Hasan-Rokem, born Galit Hasan, Finnish-born Israeli Hebrew folklorist and poet
August 31 – Van Morrison, OBE, Irish poet, singer, songwriter, author and musician
December 14 – Carolyn Rodgers (died 2010), American
Also:
Magaly Alabau, Cuban
W. S. Di Piero, American
J. D. McClatchy, gay American poet, literary critic and editor of the Yale Review
Bernadette Mayer, American
Carol Muske-Dukes, American
Alice Notley, American
Bernard O'Donoghue, Irish-born poet and academic
Leon Stokesbury, American
Birth years link to the corresponding "[year] in poetry" article:
January 15 — Ursula Bethell, New Zealand
January 22 — Else Lasker-Schuler, 75, German-born Jewish poet
c. January 27 — Antal Szerb, 43, Hungarian writer, killed in Wolfs (Balf) concentration camp; buried with pages of his bilingual anthology Száz vers ("100 poems", 1943/1944) in his pockets
February 16 – Yun Dong-ju, (born 1917), Korean poet, died in a Japanese prison (surname: Yoon; also spelled "Yoon Dong-joo" and "Yun Tong-ju")
March 20 — Lord Alfred Douglas, English poet and former lover of Oscar Wilde
May 15 — Charles Williams, English writer and poet, and a member of the loose literary circle called the Inklings
June 8 — Robert Desnos (born 1900), French surrealist poet and journalist, arrested by the Gestapo as a member of the French Resistance and sent to Buchenwald concentration camp in 1944; dies soon after liberation of Theresienstadt concentration camp in German-occupied Czechoslovakia where he was held
July 20 — Paul Valéry (born 1871), French philosopher, author and Symbolist poet
August 26 — Franz Werfel (born 1890), Austrian-Bohemian novelist, playwright, and poet writing in German
September 9 — Zinaida Gippius, 75 (born 1869), Russian poet, novelist and playwright
December 14 — Maurice Baring (born 1874), versatile English man of letters: dramatist, poet, novelist, translator, essayist, travel writer and war correspondent
Undated — Swami Ananda Acharya (born 1881), Indian poet who wrote Indian poetry in English
