Wilfrid Gibson

James Bridges (Independent Scholar - Europe)

The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 1.2.1.08: English Writing and Culture of the early Twentieth Century , 1900-1945.
Vol. editors: Chris Baldick (Goldsmiths College, University of London), Peter Childs (Birmingham Newman University), Nicole Kennedy (University of Newcastle), Louise McDonald (Birmingham Newman University), Andrew Radford (University of Glasgow), Sean Seeger (University of Essex)

Dates

Born Oct 1878
Died 1962
Activity 1902-1950

Places

Born in England
Active in England

Activities

Primary

Poet

Resources

Wilfrid Gibson was born in October 1878, the son of a Northumberland pharmacist. His early collections, for example – The Queen's Vigil (1902) and The Golden Helm (1903) – display an ornate medievalism, derived mainly from Pre-Raphaelitism. There was then a striking transition, in which Gibson found a voice that was very much his own. The poems in Daily Bread (1910) exhibit a strong degree of realism. Sympathetically portraying the struggles and miseries of ordinary working-class people, they engage with unemployment, poverty, illness, illegitimate birth, bereavement, and domestic violence. Daily Bread thus reflects the compassion that distinguishes Gibson's verse as a whole – especially with regard to workers and women. A collection written solely in dramatic format, Daily Bread is also symptomatic of a Georgian revival of verse drama.

Like many Georgians, Gibson showed...

Please log in to consult the article in its entirety. If you are a member (student of staff) of a subscribing institution (see List), you should be able to access the LE on campus directly (without the need to log in), and off-campus either via the institutional log in we offer, or via your institution's remote access facilities, or by creating a personal user account with your institutional email address. If you are not a member of a subscribing institution, you will need to purchase a personal subscription. For more information on how to subscribe as an individual user, please see under Individual Subcriptions.

419 words

Citation: Bridges, James. "Wilfrid Gibson". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 20 November 2001 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=4980, accessed 05 December 2025.]