Allen Upward

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Allen Upward (1863 - 1926) was a poet, lawyer, politician and teacher. His work was included in the first anthology of Imagist poetry, Des Imagistes, which was edited by Ezra Pound and published in 1914.

Upward was brought up as a member of the Plymouth Brethren and trained as a lawyer at the Royal University of Dublin (now University College Dublin). While living in Dublin, he wrote a pamphlet in favour of Irish Home Rule.

Upward later worked for the British Foreign Office in Kenya as a judge. Back in Britain, he defended Havelock Wilson and other labour leaders and ran for election as a Lib/Lab candidate in the 1890s.

He wrote two books of poetry, Songs of Ziklag (1888) and Scented Leaves from a Chinese Jar. He also published a translation Sayings of Confucious and a volume of autobiography, Some Personalities (1921). He shot himself in November 1926, reportedly after hearing of George Bernard Shaw's Nobel Prize award.

Reference: Sheldon, Michael. Introduction to Scented Leaves from a Chinese Jar, A Selection. (Interim Press, 1987).